The YouTube channel header is a very important success factor on YouTube. A poor hat can significantly reduce the number of subscribers, even if you have high-quality and interesting videos. In this article, I will tell you everything you need to know about the YouTube channel header: how to create a cool hat, hat sizes, where to download images for a hat for free, where to order and how to upload a hat to your channel. At the end of the article, I will show you the channel headers of the coolest YouTubers in the world and Russia. Looking ahead a little, I’ll say that many cool YouTubers advise not to make a hat yourself, but to order it from professional designers, more on this later in the article. First, let's define the terminology.
CONTENTS
What is a YouTube channel header?
The header of a YouTube channel is the image at the top of the channel. It's easier to see once than hear 100 times. This is what the header of the most popular PewDiePie channel in the world looks like today with 57 million subscribers:
The red picture above is the header of the most popular PewDiePie channel in the world with 57 million subscribers When I was writing this article, I discovered with interest that the channel header is also called " cover youtube«, « youtube banner«, « background youtube«, « youtube template«, « picture youtube". All these are other names for the YouTube channel header, although the template and picture are not the header itself, but blanks for creating it. And the official name of the cap, which is used in YouTube's help - " channel background image«.
Youtube banner sizes
Watch the official YouTube video about how the YouTube channel header is displayed on various devices (enable Russian subtitles in the video settings):
How to make a beautiful YouTube channel header from any picture
As you already understood, for the cover of the YouTube channel, you can use any image with a size of at least 2560 x 1440 pixels. In order to turn a beautiful picture into a channel header, you need to write your own text on this picture and always in the “safe zone” so that this text is displayed on all devices. You can add text to the picture in any graphics editor, for example, in Photoshop, Gimp, Paint (the easiest!) and others. When uploading an image to your channel, YouTube will show how it will be displayed on various devices:
How the YouTube header looks on different devices
If you click the "Crop" button, you can choose the area of the image that will be displayed as the header of your channel.
Any beautiful photo, photos with landscapes, and, finally, just ordinary textures can be used as a channel cover. Here's how beautiful it can look (click on the image):
Youtube banner with landscape
Youtube banner with a beautiful photo
Youtube banner with texture
You can see more examples and even download the textures in the article I took these pictures from: "20 Free YouTube One Channel Art Designs".
how to upload channel banner on youtube
Uploading a new banner to your channel is very simple - you just need to move the mouse cursor over the header of your channel, and a button will appear in the upper right corner, by clicking on which you can upload a new header:
When you click on this button, you will see a window that I already showed above in the picture “How the YouTube header looks on different devices”, and everything is already intuitively clear there. Just upload your picture and that's it. You won't have any difficulty with this. YouTube loves to change the interface, and if, when you read this article, it changes it again, then read the YouTube help "How to add or change the background image of the channel". The information must always be up to date.
Where to download pictures for YouTube for free?
Well, here are the places where you can download pictures for free. Remember that images must be at least 2560 x 1440 pixels in size.
- Google and Yandex. Search in pictures, setting the minimum image size;
- libraries of free pictures. Here are my favorites: pond5.com, pixabay.com, pexels.com, gratisography.com, unsplash.com, freepik.com. And I also have an article in which there are 12 free photo stocks: ““;
- free texture libraries. Try looking at these two: freepik.com/free-vectors/textures and pixabay.com/en/photos/?cat=backgrounds or google "free background textures" to find other sites;
- galleries of free youtube headers. There are a lot of them on the Internet, but they usually do not exist for a long time, so I will not give a link. Type in Google: "download a ready-made hat for YouTube for free."
Where to order a professional YouTube channel background and how much does it cost
It is advised to order a hat, and not to make it yourself. This is due to the fact that the design of the header is very important for the success of the channel, and if you are not a designer, then it is unlikely that you will be able to make a decent hat yourself. Therefore, it is better to buy a hat than to make it yourself. Where can I order a hat? There are such options:
Professional graphics stores, the price of a YouTube banner is 150-600 rubles
If you want to get a professional header for your channel and are willing to pay a small amount for it in the range of 150-600 rubles, then you should look at ready-made banners for YouTube at professional graphics store Graphicriver. Yes, you will pay a little, but you will save time, get a professional and beautiful hat. In addition, this hat will rarely be found anywhere, because it is paid.
It seems to me that this is the best option. You choose a ready-made professional banner for YouTube and buy it for a small amount.
Freelance exchanges, the price of a YouTube banner is 300-3000 rubles
This is my least favorite option. Usually, before you get anything freelancing, you have to negotiate, change several freelancers. At the same time, there is no guarantee that the freelancer who will make you a hat will turn out to be a professional. BUT ... The channel header ordered in this way will be 100% unique and no one else will have it! Those. you can tell the designer any of your fantasies, and he will realize them. I recommend these exchanges:
- Fiverr ($5 per header). If you still order a hat from freelancers, then I usually use the fiverr service, where all services are five dollars. Yes, the banner will cost only five bucks, but you will have to communicate in English. The same service is recommended. When I made YouTube channel headers, I usually had to change 2-3 freelancers before I got what I needed. I have been working with freelancers for many years and here I can give this advice: if after the second revision the work does not suit you, change the freelancer. With freelancers, I usually get either everything at once with one or two improvements, or never. There is no point in torturing each other if nothing happened after the first or second revision.
- Fl.ru (3000 rubles for a YouTube header, Russian). This is the oldest and most popular freelance exchange in Russia. There you will find a Russian freelancer who will make you a banner for YouTube. Use this option only if you do not know English and therefore cannot use Fiverr, and if you did not find anything suitable in professional graphics store graphicriver.net. Russian designers want at least 3,000 rudders for any banner.
Online services for creating background images for YouTube, the price of a YouTube banner is from 0 to 800 rubles
There are many services for creating a background image for YouTube, but one of them I liked is canva.com. This service is paid, but there is a powerful free plan that has a lot of very beautiful YouTube channel header templates. They look very cool! If you do not have enough features of the free plan, you can take a trial version of the paid plan for 30 days. During this time, you can do anything, and for free. The paid plan costs $13 per month.
Another service that I liked and which I used to create headers for my YouTube channels: Fotor (you can select Russian in the upper right corner). Try it, it might suit you better.
What is the difference between a brilliant YouTube channel hat and a mediocre one?
Let's see what tasks the YouTube channel header solves? What is it for? Here are the main goals that your channel header should ideally help you achieve. Ideal hat:
- It makes you want to immediately subscribe to the channel.
- Makes you want to show your hat to your friends.
- It is immediately remembered.
- Causes interest, curiosity, attracts attention.
- Immediately makes it clear what the channel is about, or causes a burning desire to find out.
- Causes positive emotions, pleasure.
- Looks cool, professional, a million dollars.
I told you about the ideally brilliant hat, and the mediocre hat is all the same, only exactly the opposite: it is not memorable, not interesting, does not correspond to the spirit and theme of the channel, causes bad emotions, makes you want to immediately leave the channel and looks very dumb.
Channel headers of the most successful YouTubers in the world and Russia
Well, in conclusion, let's look at examples of channel headers of the most successful YouTubers. Let's learn from them - how to!
PewDiePie - how it was)
This is the channel header of the most popular YouTuber in the world, PewDiePie, at the time when he had 46 million subscribers. I don't know about you, but I have no words. The first thought that comes to mind is, “Dude!” and you start laughing. It is clear that the man was just fooling around. Nevertheless, it attracts attention and is immediately remembered, it makes you want to show your friends. Please note that there is a mistake in the word TWETER on the header, since, in fact, Twitter is spelled. These are my thoughts, and what thoughts and emotions does this hat evoke in you? Tell in the comments...
PewDiePie channel header at the time of 46 million subscribers
And here is the header of his channel in the days when PewDiePie had 35 million subscribers:
PewDiePie channel header at the time of 35 million subscribers
And here's the Pewdiepie channel hat, which seems to have been with him for a long time in the early days of his activity. How many, I can’t say for sure, but I know for sure that this hat was when he had 10 and 28 million subscribers. I saw screenshots online.
And what kind of hat PewDiePie has now, you saw in the very first picture in this article. What can be said? It seems that every year the hats on his channel are getting worse and worse, and at the same time more and more interesting))).
VanossGaming
VanossGaming is the world's most popular gaming YouTuber with 21 million subscribers. As you can see, today it is an ordinary hat, there is nothing special about it. Simple but tasteful. Vanos is very popular and can afford it. Too bad we don't know what hats he had before. However, Vanos' videos are very cool and funny, even for those who do not like to play. You look like a comedy ... I recommend it!
Header of the most popular gaming channel in the world Vanossgaming
Ivan Guy
It is one of the most popular YouTube channels in Russia with 12 million subscribers. The cover speaks for itself. I have nothing to add. Do you like it)?
Frost
Frost is the most popular gaming channel in Russia with 7 million subscribers. I have a lot of respect for Frost for being so successful. But I don't like his hat, I don't think it's anything special. It is clear that the guy did not bother much.
Kate Clapp
TheKateClapp is the most popular girl channel in Russia with 6 million subscribers. I really respect Katya for what she has achieved, and I really like her videos - she is a professional. And the cover is made professionally, by a good designer. But still, its cover is some kind of color cacophony. There is no central idea and genius. It doesn’t arouse interest and curiosity, I don’t want to show my friends and subscribe ... The cover can be made much more professional and stylish.
Adobe channel
And here is the cover of the Adobe channel, which released the Photoshop graphics editor. These are very rich guys, and I think they spent a huge amount on creating this hat. And even though they only have 260k subscribers, I show their channel cover as an example of a good business channel header.
Watch a video with an overview of the hats of the most popular YouTubers in the world and Russia in ascending order of "sucks":
Instead of a conclusion - which YouTuber's hat is cooler?
Of all the hats reviewed here, I liked the PewDiePie hats the most, in my opinion, they are the coolest. No wonder PewDeepy has become the most followed YouTuber in the world. He understands that the header of the YouTube channel is one of the important factors for the success of the channel. He has the most ingenious hats I have ever seen. All other hats discussed in this article can hardly be called ingenious. In second place in terms of professionalism is VanossGaming, but our YouTubers don’t really bother with the design of caps, except for Katya Klap ... Katya Klap got confused, and confused very much.
When creating a header for your channel, focus on the unrivaled leader - PewDiePie if you have a personal channel, and on the Adobe channel header if you have a business channel, and then you will have significantly more subscribers than with a miserable header.
I hope that this article gave an exhaustive answer to the question of how to make a YouTube channel header. If not, then ask questions in the comments ...
On this page, we have placed ready-made headers for the Youtube channel, which you can freely download and install on your channel in just a couple of clicks.
Download header for Youtube channel
We know that sometimes making your own hat for YouTube is long and not interesting. In some situations, there is simply no time for it, and sometimes there is not enough inspiration or skills. Especially for such situations, we have prepared a small collection of high-quality hats for YouTube, which you can download directly from our website. All these hats were freely available, and we just collected them in one place.
Ready hats for Youtube channel
Together with the header in the presented archives, you will find a file with a font and instructions on how to install and configure the whole thing. Do not be too lazy to read and install the desired font, otherwise the whole effect of the header disappears.
Why do we need ready-made caps for the YouTube channel?
As we wrote earlier, there are a lot of situations when you need to use a template, and not something original. Starting from the lack of funds and time, and ending with the banal inability to do such things on their own.
Be that as it may, we understand this very well and therefore decided to help our readers and selected 20 free caps for the design of the YouTube channel, which are made according to all the rules that the system puts forward.
The only thing you need to change is to add your name. Fortunately, each template in the archive is accompanied by a file with fonts exactly the same as those used in the template itself. To make everything look organic.
Brief installation instructions are also inside the archive. Everything is very simple. Even without any skills, you can do it all in just a couple of minutes.
We hope that you will find in our article something that you like. If not, then write in the comments and we will help you make your own unique hat for YouTube.
Hello friends! Today I decided to tell you about several ways to make an attractive header for a YouTube channel.
I touched on this topic for a reason, because a good hat has 2 important functions at once ...
- it makes your channel unique and attractive to the target audience;
- and also as quickly as possible to acquaint visitors with the topic.
Thanks to this, the user, having entered your channel, immediately sees the header and understands what he is dedicated to. This significantly saves visitors time and also filters traffic. Moreover, many more users will click the "subscribe" button on the channel, with a good header, because it conveys the seriousness of the channel's intentions for further development.
1. Ways to create a hat
I have identified several ways to create a header for without involving third parties:
- Self-creation of a header in an image editor (Adobe Photoshop, Corel Draw, and so on);
- Working with ready-made templates;
- Use of online services.
Each of them is attractive in its own way. The first method is flexible and highly creative, but requires special technical knowledge and skills.
The second two save the time of the channel owner, but, as a rule, ready-made images are obtained as a header, often not revealing or not fully revealing the essence of the resource.
For this reason, ready-made templates are used either by beginner video bloggers or those who do not want to spend time creating a designer header for their channel.
In my opinion, every self-respecting channel owner should make a good header for YouTube and attract visitors not only with interesting videos, but also with original design. I think many of you will agree with this.
2. Create a header for a YouTube channel in Photoshop
Adobe Photoshop (FSH) is quite suitable as the software with which we will create the header. It's an affordable and relatively lightweight (in this case) image editor.
I’ll tell you more about the process of working on creating a header in FS in this video:
[Video coming soon]
When placing elements, do not forget about proportions and sizes. The background for the header on Youtube should only complement the posted information and not interfere with familiarization with it. That is, you should not choose too bright pictures, because of which text or other elements will not be visible.
2.1. Where can I find a good background for YouTube?
I noticed that a huge number of headers on YouTube have terrible design. This made me think that people do not have the basic knowledge needed to find high-quality images. Therefore, I decided to devote a separate subtitle to this topic.
First of all, I want to tell you that in the Google search engine, unlike others, you can find a lot more good pictures, since it is a global search engine, so it is preferable to use it.
Also, when searching, be sure to use a special filter. It will help you search for better images directly in the search engine:
Well, the most important tip for finding the best backgrounds for youtube: use special photo stocks.
You can always find high-quality, attractive images on them.
There are both free photo stocks and paid ones, and naturally, the former are significantly inferior in the number of images to the latter. But there is one good life hack that allows you to deliver paid products for free:
- rgbstock.com
- bigfoto.com
- freemediagoo.com
- pixabey.com
- foter.com
- everystockphoto.com
- stockphotos.io
- wylio.com
- canweimage.com
- littlevisuals.com
3. Create a header from a ready-made template 2560x1440
It is far from a secret that a YouTube header can be made from a ready-made template with a size of 2560x1440.
This method will allow you to get a professional look in just a few minutes, but it has two significant disadvantages:
- Few topics. If your channel has something unusual, then it will be difficult for you to find a suitable layout;
- Not unique style. You can be sure that at least one person has used any of the templates available for free download.
In general, I can recommend that you go to the popular VK group, where a large number of these templates are presented. You will need to download the layout and change the channel name, avatar into it, maybe play a little with the color of some elements.
- You can download the template for the YouTube header here: " Ready-made templates/caps Twitch/YouTube/Youtube PSD «.
As a result, I want to say here that this option can be used for temporary use. Then, of course, it is better to do something unique and unrepeatable.
4. Using online services
You can completely do without installing Adobe Photoshop, knowing some useful services that work online. One of them is the popular service canva.com.
You can get started right away by going to the official website of the resource. The header creation algorithm is as follows:
- click on the "Create" banner for YouTube;
- pass a simple registration;
- choose from the list what you need a banner for (for yourself, for work, for education);
- a form opens in which you need to add ready-made images for the cap on YouTube and write the text;
- if text is already applied to the image, it can be easily edited using the tools located at the top of the workspace;
- proceed to save the image by clicking on the "Download" button located at the top of the site;
- select the file type from the list of suggested ones (I chose JPEG) and wait for the download to finish.
Thus, you will receive a ready-made banner for your YouTube channel, which will fully correspond to its theme.
Users watch videos on Youtube per month and on average spend more than 1 hour a day on it. Companies cannot afford to ignore this platform as a source of traffic. If your business does not yet have a Youtube channel, we recommend starting one.
The design of the Youtube channel does not play such a critical role as the cover of a business page on Facebook. A video attracts many times more attention than a static channel header. But it also helps to brand the channel, convey a message to users and win subscribers.
If you already have a great YouTube cover, you should change and update it from time to time. How to do it easily and where to get ideas - we will tell in this article.
What is the size of the YouTube banner?
The header size varies by platform. The banner you see on the monitor is significantly different from what you see on the mobile screen. Here is a little guide:
The text should be placed in the center of the banner, then it will not be cut off on different devices. If you want to add a logo to it - place it in this "safe area". Follow the guidelines from Google:
- The minimum size of the uploaded image: 2560x1440 pixels
- The size of the “safe zone” for placing text and logo: 1546x423 pixels
- Maximum width: 2560px. The edges will be clipped on different devices.
- Upload file size: 6 MB maximum
What is a good YouTube banner?
A good Youtube channel header is another chance to tell people who visit your page about your company. So the header should be:
1.High resolution
2560 x 1440 is a large file. Some people watch YouTube videos on TV, so the banner should also look good on large screens.
2. In brand style
A YouTube channel is an opportunity to promote your brand, but it has to be done carefully. Do not put everything on the banner at once: logo, slogan, call to action and contact information. Place your logo in a “safe area” so it can be seen on all devices. Use your brand colors, fonts, and overall style.
3. Relevant to content
It's easy to get carried away with design, and sometimes you can forget the main message. The banner design should be relevant to your brand and the content you post.
How to create a banner for Youtube
In order not to create a header design for Youtube from scratch, find a simple image editor with ready-made templates. For inspiration, check out Crello's collection of themed Youtube banner templates. To create a banner, choose a template, add text and your logo.
Crello is a very handy tool - you don't have to size up and worry about running out of ideas. You can take a ready-made design as a basis and change it as you need.
7 Examples of Great Youtube Banners
Let's take a look at some good YouTube header designs from well-known brands.
- gopro
Tip: The image should contain objects that represent your brand. When in doubt, add images of people in the context of your product usage.
2. TripAdvisor B2B
Tip: use a banner to visually showcase the functionality of your product.
Tip: make your banner bright, add personality - so it will stand out from others.
Tip: if you can't choose one image, make a collage. Place your company logo or one small message in the "safe area".
Tip: Keep your target audience in mind. Lego's audience is children, and the designs are specifically designed to capture their attention.
Tip: Read about basic design tips. You will learn how to properly combine colors, objects and fonts.
Tip: Keep things simple. The LinkedIn banner has a black and white picture, and the logo is part of the text. Despite the absence of bright colors, the banner evokes emotions and is remembered.
Even if you do not have the opportunity to order a banner from a designer, you can design a Youtube channel professionally. Take a cue from big brands, look for ideas among ready-made templates and try. Good luck!
