Hey everyone, I'm Marina from Yes to Tech, and welcome back to my channel.
Have you been wondering how to enable YouTube custom thumbnails and how to add a custom
thumbnail to your YouTube videos?
In this custom YouTube thumbnail tutorial, I'll show you how to make a custom thumbnail
on YouTube with the correct YouTube custom thumbnail size.
By the end of this video, you'll know exactly how to add and enable a YouTube custom thumbnail
on YouTube studio so that you can make a YouTube custom thumbnail that gets you more views
and clicks.
If you're excited about this video, make sure you like this video, hit the subscribe button
and the bell to be notified every time I post a new video, and with that said let's jump
right in.
In order to be able to add a YouTube thumbnail to your videos, the first thing you need to
do is enable custom thumbnails on YouTube.
To do so, on YouTube, click on your icon on the top, right-hand side and then click on
'YouTube Studio'.
Click on 'settings' from the panel on the left, then on 'channel', select the 'feature
eligibility’ tab,, and then click on 'status and features'.
Here's where you'll need to click on the 'verify' button if you haven't done so already to verify
your YouTube channel.
To verify your YouTube account, all you have to do is select your country, and then ask
YouTube to either call you or text you with a verification code.
Once your YouTube channel has been verified, you'll be able to scroll down on this page
to the custom thumbnails box, and click on the 'enable' button to enable custom thumbnails
on YouTube.
Once you're able to add custom thumbnails on YouTube, you'll see that this 'custom thumbnail'
box will have a green line at the bottom.
Now that you've enabled custom thumbnails on YouTube, it's time to head over to Canva
to make a YouTube custom thumbnail with the correct YouTube custom thumbnail size.
If you don't have a Canva account yet, you can try it out for free by clicking on the
link in the description box below.
Once you've logged in to your Canva account, use the search bar to search for 'YouTube
thumbnail'.
Canva has general YouTube thumbnail templates that you can customize, as well as YouTube
thumbnails separated by niche, including beauty, tutorials, travel, food or music.
The best thing about Canva is that all of its YouTube custom thumbnails are 1280 by
720 pixels, which is the correct YouTube custom thumbnail size.
Click on the type of YouTube thumbnail you wish to create in Canva.
If you scroll down this page, you'll see a number of YouTube thumbnail templates that
you can customize, or if you prefer, you can select a blank YouTube thumbnail template
to start from scratch.
Don't worry too much which YouTube thumbnail template you choose since you can always change
it later.
Once you've selected a YouTube thumbnail design to customize, click on it to edit it.
As I mentioned, if for some reason you wish to change this YouTube thumbnail template
to another one, you can click on 'templates' from the left-hand side panel to start fresh
with another YouTube thumbnail design.
Just like with any regular Canva template, you can click on any elements on the page
to customize them, such as the background, text and images, or click on any of the options
from the left-hand side panel to add new photos, elements and text into your custom YouTube
thumbnail design.
For more details on how to customize a Canva design, make sure to watch my video on 'how
to use Canva'.
I'll leave the link to it in the description box below.
Once you're done customizing your custom YouTube thumbnail, rename your Canva design up top,
and then click on the 'download' button.
You can either download this YouTube thumbnail design as a PNG or JPG file, and then click
on the 'download' button again to save your custom YouTube thumbnail to your computer.
Now that you're done making a YouTube custom thumbnail, it's time to add this custom thumbnail
to your YouTube video.
On YouTube, click on the camera icon up top, and then on 'upload video'.
Either drag and drop the video file to upload to YouTube in the space provided, or click
on 'select files' to select and open a video file from your documents.
YouTube will start uploading your video.
To add a custom YouTube thumbnail to your video, scroll down on this page, and under
the 'thumbnail' section, click on 'upload thumbnail'.
Locate the YouTube custom thumbnail you made in Canva from your documents, and then click
on 'open'.
Then just follow the steps on this upload YouTube video popup, and once you're done,
you'll have successfully enabled, made and added a YouTube custom thumbnail on YouTube
studio that gets you more clicks and views.
If you're serious about making a YouTube custom thumbnail make sure you check out our FREE
cheat sheet with 9 brilliant tools that you should use below this video to learn more
about how to save time and boost your productivity in your online business.
Make sure you comment below and let me know if you'll be enabling and adding a custom
thumbnail to your YouTube videos.
If you liked this video, make sure you give it a thumbs up and subscribe to my channel
down below for new videos every Tuesday and Thursday at 9:45am EST, and stay tuned for
our next video which is about how to create an animated youtube intro and outro fast.
As you wait for my next video to go live, check out these two videos I have right here,
and I'll see you in my next video.