Swifty’s Twitch Ban Lasted Only Hours Before His Account Was Restored — What Happened?

Twitch streamer John “Swifty” Pyle went into full panic mode on Jan. 5, 2026, after learning his account had been banned. And while that might not sound like a huge deal to some, streaming is actually his main source of income. Swifty has dedicated his time and energy to full-time live-streaming on Twitch ever since realizing he could make money doing it — something he’s now been doing for more than 14 years, as he revealed in a post on X (formerly Twitter).

Throughout that period, he’d never dealt with any issues or bans.

So when he found out from one of his moderators, Ava, that his Twitch account had been banned, he was completely floored. Not only did the ban interfere with his income, but Swifty also shared that his wife isn’t working, as she’s at home caring for their two-week-old baby. Given Swifty’s trusted reputation on Twitch, you’re probably wondering why he was banned in the first place. Here’s what he said.

Swifty was briefly banned on Twitch, or “permabanned,” as he called it, on Jan. 5, 2026, for sharing food delivery streams on the platform. While Swifty generally posts gaming videos during his livestreams, he turned to food delivery on the side to “make ends meet” and decided to livestream it. He revealed in his Jan. 5 X post that January and February are the “worst ad revenue months of the year” on Twitch, so he decided, like most people do, to take on a side job.

He says he saw others doing it and assumed it would be fine. He even claimed he was getting more views on his food delivery streams than he was on certain gaming content. But then a call came in from his mod, Ava, who broke the bad news, telling him, “Your channel’s gone.” And sure enough, it was. Swifty said it was “a huge shock” to find out his main source of income had been taken away, especially since “[He had] been streaming for 14 years, never gotten in trouble, never got a ban, never got a suspension.”

Since the majority of Swifty and his family’s income comes from Twitch streaming, he turned to GoFundMe to help continue to make ends meet while things got sorted out with Twitch. He organized the fundraiser with a goal of $14,000 and, within just hours, had raised nearly $9,000 before donations were paused. That was because the support he got from his community of followers helped get him unbanned.

Hours after announcing his Twitch ban, Swifty returned on X to share that his access had been restored. In the follow-up video, which was shared later on Jan. 5, he could be seen beaming with excitement, telling viewers he couldn’t believe he was unbanned “so fast.”

He also made sure to shout out his community of fans, saying, “You guys got me unbanned,” and even called out other big streamers for helping bring attention to the ban. Although Swifty’s Twitch ban left plenty of fans shocked, thankfully, it only lasted a few hours.