How to Create a YouTube Background

(Foreword. What’s in here for you? This post contains a simple tutorial on how to create a YouTube background, and some examples of nice backgrounds for your inspiration).

If you’ve been on the internet for more than two hours, then you’ve probably visited YouTube and know what it is. Apart from the possibility of watching millions of videos, it offers you a chance to create your own profile and upload some videos yourself.

When you create a profile you get a little something that goes with it – a channel. You can access any YouTube channel by visiting a URL like this:

http://www.youtube.com/USERNAME

Here’s an example list of some popular YouTube channels:

Lady Gaga Official Youtube Channel

http://www.youtube.com/ladygagaofficial

CollegeHumor.com

http://www.youtube.com/Collegehumor

iJustine

http://www.youtube.com/ijustine

Nigahiga

http://www.youtube.com/nigahiga

DeStorm

http://www.youtube.com/destorm

Two of these channels have really cool backgrounds.

(A little self promotion. Here’s my background.)

How to create something like that? Let’s get right to it.

How to create a YouTube background

YouTube backgrounds work differently than their twitter brothers and sisters. YouTube backgrounds retain center alignment at all times.

This means that there’s a dead area in the middle of the background. That’s where the content is displayed, so you don’t have to bother working on it.

This area is 990-pixel wide. 990 pixels is a lot. If someone visits your channel on a 1024 pixel wide monitor, then they are only going to see 34 pixels of your background, minus the scrollbar, which makes it around 14 pixels. Not much place.

Fortunately enough nowadays not many people use monitors like that, which means that you can create something cool and don’t worry about the available space so much.

Start with a template

You can use my template. Download the Paint.NET version (get Paint.NET itself) or the PNG version (right click > save target as). Here’s how it basically looks like:

It’s 1800 pixel wide. In the middle you can see the dead space I was talking about.

What you have to do now is pretty simple actually. Just fire up some graphic software and let the creative juices flow.

Just remember, don’t put anything on the dead area because it won’t be visible anyway. Apart from that, you can do whatever you want.

One more thing, try to place all elements as close to the dead area as possible. By doing so, you will make sure that they will be visible even on smaller screens.

What about the dimensions of the background?

My template is 1800×1000 pixels, but yours doesn’t have to be the same.

Let’s start with the width. You have to make sure that your background will be visible even for the highest resolutions possible. 1920 pixel screen is the upper limit nowadays (a.k.a. the full HD). So if you want your background to be perfect no matter what, it should be 1920 pixel wide.

As you can see I’ve found a compromise by stopping at the 1800 pixel mark. It’s no surprise that the wider the graphic the larger the file.

Now about the height, I’m using a background that is 1000 pixel high. Same story here – you can use whatever size you want. If you can fit everything on 500 pixels then leave it that way.

Just pay attention to the bottom edge of your background. Try to end it with an element that is very simple. For example, a gradient transition to a solid color or something like that. This will be helpful when you’ll be setting your background in YouTube. You will have to select a default background color. This is your canvas. You have to make sure that your background looks good on the canvas, that’s why you should end it with a simple element so the transition between your background and the canvas is not visible.

How to set up a new background

1. Log in to YouTube

2. Go to your channel

3. Click the “Themes and Colors” tab

4. Click the “advanced options” link

5. Click the “Delete” link and then upload your new background

6. Fin

Now you know how to create a YouTube background. I hope this post will help you to get the work done as quickly as possible. Feel free to share your thoughts and opinions.