- In this video,
I'll show you how to change
YouTube channel names step-by-step
and the key things that you need to know before you do it.
Hey, it's Justin Brown here from Primal Video,
where we help you grow an audience
and scale your revenue with online video.
If you're seeing value in this video
make sure you give us a thumbs up
and all the links to everything we mentioned,
you can find in the description box below.
So let's jump into it.
Now there's a few reasons
that you might want a YouTube channel name change.
For a rebrand or for a fancy new channel name idea,
but the good news is, is that it's not hard.
But there are a few steps
that you don't wanna miss to prevent any downstream issues.
So we're gonna walk you through the full process right now,
along with everything that you need to know
to get it done right.
So the first thing to be aware of
is that there's actually two different types
of YouTube channels.
There is a personal channel
and also a brand or a business account channel.
Now the process for changing your YouTube channel name
for either one of those two types of accounts
is gonna be a little bit different
but I'm gonna show you for both scenarios
so that you're covered.
But the biggest difference between the two
is that a personal account is linked
to an individual email address,
whereas a brand account,
you can have multiple managers
or multiple people assigned to help you manage
and run that channel.
So we're gonna tackle your personal account
and changing the name on your personal account first
and then we'll move into the brand
or the business account after that.
Now if you're not sure what type of account you've got,
let's figure that out first.
So you wanna head over to your YouTube channel
and make sure you're signed into the right account.
You then wanna open up YouTube Studio
and come down to the bottom left corner for settings
and over to channel, advanced settings,
and scroll to the bottom
and down here, you wanna open up manage YouTube account.
So in here, if you already have a brand account,
you'll see here, you have the option for channel managers
and you can add or remove managers for your channel.
This is telling you you have a brand or business account.
If you have a personal account,
then this is what you'll see,
no mention at all of channel managers.
Okay, so we're gonna look at changing the name
on a personal channel first
because there's a little bit more involved
and then I'll show you how to do it
on a brand channel as well.
Okay, so I'm on my test personal account now,
I'm gonna change the name of this channel.
Currently, just my first name and last name, Justin Brown.
So if we come down the bottom here to settings,
over to channel.
Then here, this is where they're giving you the option
to edit your channel name.
It says, "To edit your channel name,
you need to visit your Google account,"
because this account is linked directly
to my Google account.
So if I select on this,
then this is where we can change your channel name,
but the biggest gotcha here
is that you can only enter in a first name and a last name
because this is still a personal account.
So to be able to name our channel
absolutely anything at all,
we need to actually convert it
from a personal account over to a brand account.
And then we can name it whatever we want.
So we'll cancel out of this now and close this window,
go back to our YouTube channel.
So then come back over to advanced settings.
Again, we just found our settings
down the bottom left-hand corner,
advanced settings, scroll right to the bottom,
and let's choose manage YouTube account.
Now in order here to be able to move this YouTube channel
over to a brand account,
we first need to create a brand account or a brand channel.
So we're going to go here, add or manage your channels.
So you can see here
we've got our main Primal Video channel.
We've also got this personal channel here,
this temporary account that we're about to move.
And there's some other ones that are blurred out
that I am a manager of as well.
So we're going to go up here to create a new channel,
and don't worry, we're still gonna be moving our old one
over into this new one.
And now we get to give that channel a name.
So let's call it Justin's Super Awesome Channel,
amazing name, and hit create.
So now we have a new channel
called Justin's Super Awesome Channel.
Now here, you want to switch this account
back to the account that you want to change to.
So you want to hit on the little profile picture
at the top there,
come down to switch account,
and you want to select the channel that you want to move.
I'll select my personal one here.
Then you want to go back
into your YouTube Studio dashboard area
again for the old channel,
down to settings, channel, advanced settings,
then down to manage YouTube account,
and you want to hit here view advanced settings.
And then down towards the bottom here,
you can see that you can move channel to a brand account.
So if we select on this one,
it's now going to let us select down the bottom here
Justin's Super Awesome Channel, which is a brand account.
Now you're going to get a little message pop-up saying,
"There's already a YouTube channel
that is associated with this account.
Do you want to delete it?"
And yes, we're going to delete that
because it's a brand new channel that we had to create,
it's got zero subscribers, no videos and no playlists.
You want to double-check
that you've got the right one there,
and then you want to hit delete channel.
And this is where you can verify
that this move is going to happen for you.
So you can see that we're moving my old channel,
my personal channel, in the name of Justin Brown,
which had four subscribers and one video and no playlists.
And it was connected to my personal Google account.
And my channel after we move it
is going to still have four subscribers
one video and no playlists,
but the channel name is going to be
Justin's Super Awesome Channel.
And it is now a brand account.
So what we need to do then is hit move channel,
and it's popping up another confirmation box here
letting you know that your channel name and icon
will be updated across YouTube.
Your channel URL will not actually change,
so you're going to keep this same one.
But it does give you the warning
that some of your content can't be transferred
and that your YouTube comments can't be moved.
So if you'd responded to people's comments
or you'd left comments on your own videos,
then those will not be transferred over
with your new account.
But all the comments
from everyone else on all of your videos
will still be there.
Now, the last thing to be aware of
before you hit that move channel button there,
is that if you already have a custom URL for your channel.
So you're already past a hundred subscribers
and you've claimed a custom URL,
then this won't transfer over in this process.
You will need to contact YouTube Support
and get them to link up your previous channel custom URL
to your new channel as well.
And I've heard that this can be done relatively quickly
but I've also heard some people waiting
up to a month for that to actually happen.
So all that's left to do here is just select move channel
and it's going to happen for us.
Your YouTube channel has been successfully moved.
Your channel now is called Justin's Super Awesome Channel.
And it says, "It might take up to 10 minutes
for this to be completed."
So we'll go okay.
Now because you've just transferred your channel
over to a brand account,
you will need to switch over to that brand account
to make sure that everything has come across.
So again, you wanna come up to your profile picture
in the top right-hand corner,
come down to switch account,
and in here, you're going to select your new channel,
your new brand account,
Justin's Super Awesome Channel.
Now don't worry, your thumbnail image or your avatar image
and everything will come across.
As it said, it might take up to 10 minutes.
So if we select on this,
and now let's go to our YouTube Studio,
you can see that the YouTube channel name
is now Justin's Super Awesome Channel
and we still have our four subscribers on this channel.
And we still have our videos, one video, 20 views.
And you can see it's even kept our comments
cause there's still four comments on that video as well.
So that's how you can change your YouTube channel name.
If you're on a personal account,
you will need to transfer it over
to a business or a brand account.
Now, what if you want to change the name
of your business or your brand account?
So to do that, you want to head over to YouTube
and make sure that you've got the right account selected,
and come down to settings,
and where it says your channel and your channel name,
you can then select edit on Google, just underneath that.
Now in here under basic info,
you've got your channel name.
So we can just select on that,
hit the little edit button,
you will need to verify your accounts,
so enter your password, and we can enter a new channel name,
Justin's Really Super Awesome Channel,
then we hit save and that change has now been applied
and our channel name has now changed.
So if we head back over to YouTube now
to verify that our channel name here is now
Justin's Really Super Awesome Channel.
So you can see the process of changing your name
if you're already on a brand account
is far simpler than converting from a personal
to a brand account and then changing your name.
Now, whether you're on a personal or a brand account,
if your channel has more than 100 subscribers
and your channel is verified,
then you can claim a custom URL.
So that's where people can just
go to youtube.com/ your channel name
to be taken directly to your channel.
So to check if you're eligible
or to get this set up,
you again want to go back
to your YouTube Studio dashboard area.
You want to come down to settings, channel,
over to advanced settings,
and then scroll all the way to the bottom
and select manage YouTube account.
And then you want to come down to view advanced settings.
I mean, hey, YouTube, make this easier,
menus upon menus upon menus,
and then you'll have the option down here for custom URL.
And for me, right now it's saying
that this channel is not currently eligible
for a custom URL.
So again, it says here to be able to get a custom URL,
you need to have 100 or more subscribers,
have a channel that's at least 30 days old,
you need to have a photo uploaded as a channel icon,
and have some channel art as well.
But if you are eligible,
there'll be a button there to click
which will let you create your custom URL.
So it really is that simple.
And you can actually change your custom URL
up to three times per year.
So it really is that simple.
So now that you've changed your YouTube channel name,
if you'd also like to know how to get your videos
showing up on YouTube,
actually having your videos rank
in YouTube search and in suggestions,
then check out the video linked on screen
where we share our top three tools
for helping you do just that.
And I'll see you in the next one.