Introduction
Whenever you make a YouTube channel, it will be visible to the public by default; anybody will be able to see what you upload. However, the videos you hide will remain hidden even if you have a public channel. YouTube recently changed its policies so, if you created a YouTube channel before 2012, your channel will automatically be hidden and you will have to manually change and update these privacy settings. In this article, we will tell you how to make your YouTube channel public.
Privacy Settings on Youtube
YouTube provides three types of privacy settings for users that are Private, Unlisted and Public. With public videos, anyone on Youtube can easily access your video and share it on Youtube or across different social media platforms. These videos are also the ones that pop up as search results on YouTube. Private videos can only be seen by you (the creator) or by people with whom you choose to share the video.
Private videos also don’t appear in search results or on the homepage. However, YouTube systems and human reviewers will have access to the private videos and will review them for ad sustainability, copyright or any other prevention mechanisms. People who only want their family and friends to see their video tend to keep it private. On the other hand, people who want to make YouTube a career benefit from keeping their channel public. Thus, making your channel public will allow more people to see your video, share your content and drive more traffic in too!
In the case of unlisted videos, they are similar to public videos as people can easily watch and share them. However, these videos do not show up in anybody’s search results unless someone searches for it with the exact URL. Unless you add an unlisted video to a public playlist, people won’t be able to see it pop up in search results. Hence, setting your video as unlisted will help if you don’t mind other people accidentally stumbling across your video.
How to Make Your YouTube Channel Public? (Step-by-Step Guide)
Keep in mind that once you make your channel public, anyone can watch all of your videos (other than the ones you have manually hidden). This is the one thing that you need to keep in mind before following the steps on how to make your YouTube channel public.
- Sign in to your YouTube Studio account
- Once you are signed in, you will see a menu on the left of the screen. From this menu, click on Content
- Now your videos will be displayed in front of you. Pick the video that you want to update the privacy of. If want to update the privacy of a live video, click on the Live tab
- A down arrow will be displayed. Click on it and an option of Visibility will be shown. The options will be Public, Private and Unlisted
- After clicking on Public, click on the Save button located at the bottom of the screen.
Conclusion
We hope that our easy step-by-step guide on how to make your YouTube channel public has helped you. Now that you know all of the differences between the different privacy settings, you can easily change it anytime you want. Setting your YouTube channel public might not be the best way if you want just one video to be seen by your viewers. The decision between public, private and unlisted depends on the creator and what they want the content to do.
By using these privacy settings, you can actively limit and expand the reach of the video. However, you can maintain your privacy by controlling the video settings on each upload. The best part is that you can control the privacy settings on live streams as well!
