Imane Anys (born 14 May 1996), better known by her online alias Pokimane, is a Moroccan-Canadian Internet personality. As a Twitch streamer and YouTuber, Anys is best known for her live streams on Twitch, broadcasting video game content, most notably in League of Legends and Fortnite. She is a member of OfflineTV, an online social entertainment group of content creators.
Career
Twitch streaming
Anys attended McMaster University and studied chemical engineering but dropped out later to pursue her streaming career full time. She gained 450,000 followers on Twitch in 2017, earning her account a place within the 100 most followed on the platform. As a result of her account’s rise on the platform in 2017, the Shorty Awards named her as the Best Twitch Streamer of the year. The Shorty Awards detailed that her gameplay and commentary streams of League of Legends propelled her to popularity on Twitch. Anys had a cameo appearance in a League of Legends trailer announcing a new game mode.
Anys has been known to stream gameplay and commentary of Fortnite, which she first streamed as part of a sponsorship. At E3 in 2018, Epic Games, the developers of Fortnite, arranged a pro–am event. The event paired streamers with mainstream celebrities in a match of Fortnite‘s Battle Royale mode; Anys was paired with rapper Desiigner but shortly before the event, he was replaced with basketball player Josh Hart. In mid-March 2019, Anys addressed her declining amount of Fortnite streams, stating that she needed to “think about what I like or dislike about the content that I’ve been making.”
Tech news website Digital Trends detailed that Anys frequently interacts with her audience and described her “laidback but enthusiastic personality” as “perfectly suited to long-form streams.” Aside from streaming gaming content, Anys also podcasts and streams miscellaneous real-world moments.
As one of the more popular streamers on the platform, Twitch has directly partnered with Anys. In July 2018, Twitch selected her as one of 15 ambassadors for the 2018 iteration of their TwitchCon event. Later that month, Twitch also scheduled Anys as a partner for their Twitch Creator Camp, a series of broadcasts and articles designed to help content creators build successful channels. In March 2020, Anys signed a multi-year exclusivity with Twitch. Social Blade listed Anys as the 7th most followed user on Twitch, with over 7.5 million followers as of 21 March 2021.
In late October 2020, Anys collaborated with U.S. representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ilhan Omar along with several other notable streamers including Disguised Toast and HasanAbi for a session of Among Us as part of a get-out-the-vote initiative for the 2020 United States presidential election.
Anys was named a featured honoree in the 2021 Forbes 30 Under 30 under the category of “Games”, which noted her prominence as the largest female streamer on Twitch and as one of the founders of OfflineTV.
YouTube
In addition to streaming on the Twitch platform, Anys also has mutiple YouTube channels: Pokimane, Pokimane Too, Pokimane VODS, Poki ASMR, and imane. The Pokimane channel features edited gaming clips from streams while Pokimane Too includes unrelated clips of her gaming content, vlogs, and podcast. On the Pokimane VODS channel, full unedited VOD clips of streams are uploaded. The Poki ASMR channel featured videos that are part of a broader YouTube community of ASMR content, though Anys has ceased uploading on the channel. In 2021, Anys launched a new channel entitled simply ‘imane’ which covers more personal topics and vlogs rather than gaming-related topics.
Anys is also a member of OfflineTV, a collaborative YouTube channel made up of content creators. Speaking about the channel, Anys stated, “it’s not fun being a streamer and living alone, so we decided to come together in a way so we not only keep each other company but we can also collab and actually do good work and content for everyone else.”
Other ventures
In October 2019, it was announced that Anys, among a number of other internet personalities, will appear in the film Free Guy, directed by Shawn Levy, which will be released in May 2021.
In June 2020, Anys joined Markiplier and Jacksepticeye’s fashion brand Cloak as a partner and creative director.
Awards and nominations
| Year | Ceremony | Category | Result | Ref. |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018 | 10th Shorty Awards | Twitch Streamer of the Year | Won | |
| 8th Streamy Awards | Live Streamer | Nominated | ||
| The Game Awards 2018 | Content Creator of the Year | Nominated | ||
| 2019 | Esports Awards | Streamer of the Year | Nominated | |
| 2020 | Canadian Game Awards | Best Canadian Streamer | Nominated | |
| Esports Awards | Streamer of the Year | Nominated | ||
| 10th Streamy Awards | Live Streamer | Nominated |
Filmography
Film
| Year | Title | Role | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2021 | Free Guy | Herself | Post-production |