[ANSWERED] How Does Chaturbate Work?

Q: Exactly what is Chaturbate and how does it work?

Answer:

Chaturbate is a web site where viewers can go to watch naked girls masturbate live on video. Girls go to the site and masturbate in front of cameras for the public because they hope to be paid to do so.

The word is a portmanteau or construction of two words, Chat and Masturbate, hence it is spelt with a “u”. It is not chatErbate.

A cam girl site

A cam girl site is one where cam girls can broadcast a live video stream from their computer so that other people can watch. They are referred to as cam “girls” because they are mostly female and young hence “girls” but there are also men and older women on the sites.

All the cam girls broadcasting for payment are of legal age, and this is confirmed and maintained up by checking identity documents they have to upload.

Chaturbate is the world’s largest cam girl site, but there are many other sites each of which has a slightly different take on the concept.

Anyone can view or broadcast

While in theory everybody can view or broadcast on Chaturbate, and there is some cross-over, for the most part, there are two groups of people using Chaturbate. The Viewers, who are mostly men, and the Broadcasters, who are mostly women and hence are called “cam girls”.

I’ll explain how it works for this basic and common cases, and then mention some other alternatives including gay cams, cam2cam, and groups.

Nude performing sex acts with sex toys

The cam girls will broadcast undressed, nude, or in lingerie, and will perform sex acts from striptease through to hardcore sex using dildos, vibrators, and other sex toys.

While a few cam girls are broadcasting their sexual activities purely for fun, the real exhibitionists, this is rare and the majority of cam girls are broadcasting as paid entertainment.

The viewers of the broadcasts can watch without paying but will need to offer small payments or “tips” in order to interact with the cam girls. This is often in the form of “tip for requests” or a “tipping menu” whereby the broadcaster specifies a particular cost for a particular action.

“50 tokens to show ass” might be a typical example.

Pay using tokens

Payments are made using “tokens” which is an internal payment system on this site. Each token costs ten cents for a viewer to purchase, and is valued at 5 cents to the broadcaster who receives it. The difference is the fee taken by Chaturbate who operates the website.

A viewer may join the site as a member by providing a user name and email address, no credit card or payment details are required, or the viewer may be an anonymous guest on the system.

Whether as a guest or a signed-up member the viewer can browse the available live webcam rooms, of which there are typically several thousand active at any one time, and choose which one to view.

Text chat

A video window with a corresponding text chat window allows the viewer to see the cam girl and at the same time read the discussion between her and other people watching her. The audio of the cam girl is normally turned on and the viewer can choose to mute it or adjust the volume. Some cam girls keep their sound muted from their side but this is unusual.

If the viewer wishes to participate in the text-based chat with the cam girl then they need to join as a member. Free membership will be good enough in some cases but cam girls may choose to only allow paid members to chat in their room, this is more common in the most popular rooms.

Even the smallest purchase of tokens will be enough for a member to chat in this siutation. A one off payment of $10.99 for 100 tokens is the minimum purchase allow.

Tips for requests

Those tokens can be used by a viewer to give tips to the cam girls, either generally to please her and to cause her to respond just to him, or to pay for a specific action she has agreed to do for that sum on a menu.

The default tip is 25 tokens, so the minimum purchase of 100 is only 4 of those defaults amounts. It is possible to tip less, including 1 token at a time, though cam girls differ in how they respond to this, some find it mean or ungenerous.

It is also possible to take a cam girl into a private chat room where only the paying member can watch or chat with her. This is much more expensive though as it is paid by the minute and each cam girl sets their own price at one of the allowed price points from 6 tokens through to 90 tokens a minute.

Broadcasting gender choices

Although most of the live video chat rooms at Chaturbate feature female performers, there are also some with men and groups of people, including hetro couples, two or more females in one room or other combinations.

Each of these combinations may attract particular viewers who like that situation. Single male performers or “cam boys” are most providing for gay men, it is very rare to see a female watching a male performer.

Cam2cam or 2-way cam

Many viewers want the cam girls to see them as well. This is technically possible but requires the “viewer” to also be a “broadcaster”.

As the cam girls have no interest in watching the viewers they will only do this if paid to do so. Typically as a small tip to look briefly, or as a private for continuse watching.

Group shows

Chat rooms in which there are many people broadcasting are more like watching an orgy. In that case the vibre is more of a strip club or night club where people are watching and may be tipping to contribute to a show.

This sorts of live chat video room can be quite popular with thousands of viewers, however they tend not to be so interactive. Hence the income for the performers is rarely proportional as most of the viewers tend to sit back and watch without contributing financially.

@misc{Tsoi_2020,
  title={[ANSWERED] How Does Chaturbate Work?},
  url={https://www.adult-webcam-faq.com/faq/how-does-chaturbate-work/},
  publisher={Adult Webcam FAQ},
  author={Hony Tsoi},
  year={2020},
  month={Oct.}
}