14 Fun Gifts For The Content Creator In Your Life

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Love it or hate it, content creation is a viable career these days, and a way for someone to potentially make some side money if nothing else. We already have a billionaire YouTuber, after all, and almost every last one of today’s top creators started in their room with zero followers. And competition is fierce. The difference between sinking and swimming can sometimes come down to sheer production value, which can require expensive gear that someone starting out doesn’t have or can’t afford; a webcam lit by a bedroom incandescent bulb simply won’t cut it. If you want to help them get the ball rolling, we have some gift recommendations.

The following list covers gear you can gift to a content creator on virtually any platform, assuming they’re making the typical talking-head content with a microphone and some overlaid B-roll footage. The good news is a lot of it can be had for cheap. The bad news is that it takes a lot more than you might think for a content creator to film even a simple 10-minute video. These 14 items are usually essentials for the craft.

Elgato We cannot overstate the importance of lighting when filming. Where it’s positioned, how strong it is, what color it is — it all can drastically change the look and feel of a creator’s footage. Usually it’s advisable to have at least one studio light at an angle to the subject, to create a more dramatic, emotive image. Studio lights can get expensive, but one that’s relatively affordable is the Elgato Key Light, recommended by pros. It reaches up to 2,800 lumens and features a temperature range between 2,900 and 7,000 K — so both the harsh, sterile light that LEDs are known for and warmer lighting for a homey glow — and is UV-free. Its LEDs also last longer and produce less heat. You can control the lighting wirelessly from your computer or phone.

We admit the $179.99 price tag is steep as a gift, especially for someone who’s just trying content creation without fully committing. In that case, you can get a pair of studio lights for less than a third of the price if you don’t mind a lesser-known brand. NiceVeedi makes a highly rated LED light kit duo for $49.99. It has a similar 2,800-6,500 K color temperature range and comes with a full kit of tripods, phone mounts, and power cables. Having used a very similar brand, we can say your jaw would drop at how well they work considering what you pay.

Neewer Another kind of light creators will often use is an accent light, typically a colorful light in the background that adds an extra bit of flavor to the shot. It’s optional and minor, but it certainly makes a video feel a pinch more professional. This magnetic light wand is just the ticket. For $27.99 you get a tube-shaped RGB mini LED light that can fit in your pocket and put out a wide beam angle and a wide gamut of color temperatures.

It could also be used for more dramatic lighting effects, like flashing lights, or to mimic other artificial lighting sources, like a candle or an alarm. It’s highly portable thanks to its rechargeable battery, which is rated to give you about two hours of use at max brightness. You could use one of these to add that gorgeous bluish or reddish edge to the subject of your shot, such as when filming a boomerang during a product review. In any case, it’s an extremely affordable way to add a lot of character and emotion to an already well-lit shot.

Yarrashop When all else fails in the lighting department, get a ring light. It’s an easy and effective way to create studio-esque lighting for a talking head, without having to go through the tedium of setting up an entire studio. In our view, the ring light is the best all-rounder since it creates good lighting in any space — especially one where you wouldn’t have room for studio lights — and works on a tight budget. We recommend this one.

This model might be preferable for content creators in particular, since it’s large and comes with an adjustable stand and a phone mount. Basically everything you need to quickly set up your shot. Pros recommend it. We’ve also taken a look at the highest-rated ring lights in the past. There are countless options out there, and this is one of those products where it’s hard to mess up, so shop around and see what you like.

Hemmotop Green screens continue to be an effective way to remove a background and replace it. Apps like CapCut make green screen removal a process that takes less than a minute. It’s no longer complicated or expensive like it used to be. A highly rated choice for the screen in question is this green screen backdrop with a stand. It includes a tripod, top bar, and clips to hold the screen in place.

Having said that, a green screen is not strictly necessary. TikTok has already had an automatic “green screen” for years that intelligently removes the background. However, that effect is quite patchy and won’t fit high-production-value content. Green screens remain a go-to if that’s the case.

We’d recommend asking the content creator you’re going to gift this to whether they need a green or a blue screen, too. The latter can be preferable in certain situations depending on what colors they’re working with. You can purchase a blue screen from the same link we provided.

DJI The DJI Osmo Pocket 4 is far and away the camera for content creators who want smooth, stabilized video while walking around and vlogging. Until you see the price tag. At $600 for the Creator Combo, it’s a gut-punch of a price and probably a few years of Christmas and birthday presents combined. A significantly cheaper option is the DJI Osmo Mobile 8 gimbal stabilizer, which uses your phone as the camera and costs a fraction of what the Osmo does at $149.

That might seem like a lot for something that’s just supposed to hold your phone, but you’re getting your money’s worth, we think. For one, it is a truly exceptional gimbal tripod that can hold a phone steady in almost any orientation for almost any sort of shooting scenario — whether moving shots or stationary ones. Plus, it incorporates automatic face and pet tracking via a little module. If a content creator needs object-tracked footage, this is one of the easiest and most affordable ways to get their foot in the door. It’s well suited to someone filming alone, thanks to the inclusion of gesture controls.

Aochuan Okay, we admit that some people would never consider a DJI gimbal with tripod in a million years. Fair enough. Something that gets very close and costs less than half the price is this smart three-axis gimbal stabilizer. It lacks DJI’s face and object tracking module, but it does have an app that aims to replicate most of that tracking. Otherwise, it’s a versatile and capable gimbal tripod for shooting in all scenarios, with useful controls like one that flips your phone between vertical and horizontal orientation.

We don’t want to sound like we’re damning this thing with faint praise while in the shadow of DJI; reviews generally find it to be more than just a cheap alternative — they find it to be good. You’re getting much of the feature set and functionality of the Osmo Mobile 8. For someone caught between the dirt-cheap tripods that barely succeed in holding a phone steady and the tripods priced for MrBeast’s budget, this makes for a nice middle ground.

Rollei The frustrating reality of most smartphones is that the best camera is on the back, not the selfie cam where you can use the screen to frame your shot. Since most content creators starting out are probably using their smartphone as their camera, a relatively cheap “fix” is a selfie monitor, a little screen that attaches to the back of your phone to show you the view from the back camera.

A highly rated option we like is the Rollei M4 selfie monitor. It’s a screen that mirrors 4K 60 FPS video that, while perhaps overkill, will make sure you can see every detail that you possibly could on something the size of a magnetic power bank. It connects wirelessly and claims to have low latency, so the image is behind by only milliseconds. The battery should last you about three hours.

At $43.99, we’d say this is a much easier pill to swallow than buying a camera with a flip screen that costs north of $500. It also has a 4.4-star average across over 2,500 reviews. If your gift recipient has an Android phone (other than a Google Pixel) or another phone without MagSafe, don’t worry — the monitor comes with a magnetic sheet to retrofit most devices.

Fifine Aside from cameras, most content creators will want a microphone with professional-sounding audio. Look at the $439 price tag of the industry darling Shure SM7B, though, and a content creator might feel their dream is too expensive. So here’s the good news: good microphones can be cheap. Look no further than the Fifine AM8 or the Fifine K688, both beloved budget microphones among content creators who don’t feel the Shure is justified — and gift buyers who feel the same.

The AM8 is the cheapest option we’d recommend at $56.99 on Amazon, and if you can afford a bit extra, the K688 ($72.99 on Amazon) is an exceptional choice. Both support USB, with the option for an XLR connection if the creator upgrades to an audio interface later. They come with a tap-to-mute button and can be secured to a boom arm or stand of your choosing. Neither requires software to get up and running — they are genuine plug-and-play microphones.

So how do they sound? In a word, way better than their price should allow them to. Here’s a YouTuber demoing the AM8, and you’d probably have no idea it was a budget microphone if no one told you. Here’s another showing off the K688. You would probably have to spend several hundred dollars on a mic before it would sound noticeably better, we think. I can vouch for the K688 as a proud owner myself.

DJI It’s very common these days for content creators to use Bluetooth or wireless microphones in place of desktop-based dynamic or condenser microphones. They’re small and inconspicuous, can attach to clothing, and can sound way better than they have any right to sound. If you watch a lot of content creators, then you have probably seen many of them sporting the DJI Mic Mini. It has top-notch audio quality and only runs you about $59 on Amazon for two transmitter mics and a receiver.

In theory, the receiver will capture audio up to 400 meters away. Built-in are noise cancellation modes to extract clean vocals if you’re in a busy city or other noisy environment. You should also get about 10 hours of battery, total, from a transmitter and receiver combo. Considering that DJI is typically viewed as the expensive professional brand, the DJI Mic Mini is proof you can get good audio nearer to the budget range. It’s not the only DJI mic either, for the record. We’ve previously looked at other DJI mics, such as the DJI Mic 2, and it’s hard to go wrong with any of them.

Hollyland DJI is not the only player in the wireless mic game. Another solid choice is the Hollyland Lark M2. It’s a bit pricier at $76, but it earns strong reviews from those who have used it. It might also be easier to get going forward, given DJI’s struggles in the U.S. market. The Lark M2 has a USB-C receiver that plugs into your phone and two lavalier mics that can achieve 1,000-foot range. Despite being wireless mics, they can still capture 48 kHz/24-bit audio, and they incorporate their own noise cancellation for loud shooting conditions. The built-in buttons allow you to start filming and change noise cancellation modes.

One thing that’s impressive about them is their 30-hour total battery life, or about 10 hours for a single use without noise cancellation. They’re like AirPods, with their own charging case to cart them around safely in a pocket or bag. They’re also just as easy to use: pop them out of the case, pair them, use them, and stow them. Updates and adjustments can be done through the official HollyAudio app.

It’s worth noting that some content creators use wireless mics even at home. If you’re choosing between a desktop mic and a wireless mic as a gift, a wireless mic might be the safer bet since it works anywhere.

Neewer Unless a creator is going to talk off the cuff, they’re going to need a script, and it’s going to look weird if they’re reading that script without looking directly at the camera. A teleprompter is a must. There are two ways around this: using a teleprompter app on a smartphone with the selfie camera, or building a DIY setup with a smartphone reflecting the script off a pane of glass. But both require compromises: either using the inferior selfie cam to film videos, or having to borrow a second smartphone from someone else. A dedicated teleprompter could be a worthwhile investment.

We admit teleprompters are not cheap, but they are cheaper than you may anticipate. This 11-inch Neewer teleprompter costs $239 and works like the ones the professionals use by hiding the camera behind the glass. It includes its own 9-inch LCD screen that you can use to mirror the screen of another device.

Anker Content creators, particularly vloggers, will find themselves on the road with cameras, microphones, laptops, and even drones that all need to charge — especially if they’re in an unfamiliar city or a foreign country where plugs could be sparse and weird-looking. A power bank is a must. This huge Anker 25,000mAh, 165W Travel Power Bank is so capacious and powerful it can charge a MacBook Pro, so it’s more than capable of charging virtually anything in a content creator’s toolkit.

Aside from its capacity and charging speed, it has a helpful screen that will tell the user exactly how much it’s putting out and how long the battery needs to recharge. The two built-in cables also mean someone doesn’t have to rummage around for a cable to do the charging. You could conceivably do a whole day of shooting with this as the primary (and perhaps only) power source.

Linsoul When making videos, sound is just as important as the visuals. Creators often rely on reference speakers and headphones that play it clean and as-is — without spicing up the sound too much, as consumer headphones tend to do — when they mix and master the sound before exporting a video. Reference gear can get expensive, but luckily there are budget options within the financial reach of just about anyone. A budget pair that’s been around for years and never fails to impress is the KZ ZS10 Pro from Linsoul. I owned these for years, and they are excellent IEMs (for the price) if someone wants better accuracy while working with audio.

To produce detailed sound, they have four balanced armatures and one dynamic driver per ear. The in-ear design should help to isolate sound, and they have wires with over-ear hooks that are less likely to get yanked out during use. You can also buy a cable that comes with a microphone, if you like. For just $49.99, they sound like headphones that should cost several hundred dollars more.

Elgato Elgato’s Stream Deck is a tool many content creators swear by since it puts all of your most frequently used apps and actions in one place. It’s so good that many people who aren’t streamers use it for entirely different reasons. It costs $149 for a 15-key pad, which seems like quite a lot when that’s how much a good mechanical keyboard runs you. We’d like to look at a few cheaper alternatives that effectively do the same thing.

Fifine makes a Stream Deck competitor, the D6 RGB. Same 15 LCD-lit macro keys, except this time for less than half the price at $64.99. Though it has fewer than 900 ratings, they are mostly positive at a 4.6-star average. The Soomfon Stream Controller is another budget alternative for $59.99. Again, for someone who may be interested in a Stream Deck — but not be certain that they need it — this is less than half the price and effectively does the same thing.

Who is Danny/Shutterstock Becoming a content creator is challenging because engaging content is only half the battle; making the eye-popping stuff that gets views requires buying a whole bunch of equipment — cameras, lights, microphones, etc. — which can get expensive really fast. And most people aren’t interested in giving gifts that cost more than $100. So we made this list with the assumption that the recipient is someone who’s relatively new on the scene, trying to carve out their piece of the algorithm. Someone doing this in their free time and not making much money from it, who can live with budget options until they take off.

With that in mind, for most pieces where there was a piece of equipment that most would consider expensive — over $100 — we tried to find a cheaper alternative for half the price or less. In basically every case there is a good budget option out there. If there’s a content creator in your life, chances are very high any one of the items on this list would be something they could use — but definitely make sure to ask when in doubt.