YouTube banner size: dimensions, safe area and how to make one

The banner (still called channel art in a lot of guides) is the wide image across the top of your channel page. YouTube uses the same image on computers, phones and TVs, and its help page sets these rules for it:

YouTube's page lists no file types for the banner (its profile picture takes JPG, GIF, BMP or PNG). Save a JPG for a photo, which keeps the file small, or a PNG for flat colors and crisp text. YouTube's banner tips go a step further than “recommended”: they say to make it at least 2560 × 1440 “to achieve the best display on all devices”.

The safe area is the part of the banner YouTube calls safe for text and logos: the middle, which stays on screen however a device crops the image. YouTube gives it at the minimum size: 1235 × 338 pixels, in the middle of a 2048 × 1152 image. That's 60% of the width and only 29% of the height: a wide, short strip.

Scaled to 2560 × 1440, the area grows with the image, to about 1544 × 423, starting about 508 pixels in from the left and right and 509 from the top and bottom. Everything outside it is background: a TV shows all of it, a computer only the parts to the left and right of the safe area, and YouTube doesn't say how much of it a phone shows.

What fits in that strip, at a size people can read on a phone:

• Your channel's name, big. It's the one thing every visitor should read.
• One line about what you post, in the words a new viewer would use: “Bike repairs you can do at home”, not a slogan.
• When you post, or your @handle. YouTube's own banner tips suggest putting your upload schedule on it, so fans know when to come back.

Three lines is about the limit; four start to shrink to unreadable. To scale the safe area to another 16:9 size, keep its shares of the width and height; the aspect ratio calculator works out the other side of any 16:9 size for you.

YouTube's help page says only that the same banner “shows differently depending on your device”, and that images “will get cropped on certain views and devices”. What that means in practice, from what youtube.com asked for when we checked on October 22, 2026:

On a computer, the channel page asks YouTube's image server for the banner cropped to its full width and the middle 29% of its height: about 2560 × 423 pixels at the largest. So the top and bottom of the image never show on a computer, only the band across the middle. Its left and right ends do show, so run the background all the way out to both edges.

On a TV, YouTube's TV app asks for the whole image, top to bottom. It's the view YouTube singles out when it recommends 2560 × 1440 “especially for TV”, and the one place the edges of your image are seen in full.

On a phone, YouTube publishes no exact crop. Its mobile site asked for the same middle band as a computer, shown on a much narrower screen, and YouTube doesn't say how its apps crop it. That's what the safe area is for: what's inside it shows everywhere, so you don't need to know each crop.

The free YouTube banner maker makes a 2560 × 1440 banner in your browser, with the text placed inside the area every device shows. Nothing is uploaded, there's nothing to sign up for, and there's no watermark.

1. Pick a background: a color, a gradient, or your own image, which you can move and zoom.
2. Type your channel's name, a line about what you post, and a third line: your schedule, or your @handle.
3. Choose a look (Clean, Outline or Box), an accent color and the alignment for the text. It stays inside the safe area.
4. Preview it on every device at once (the safe area and the computer's band marked on the whole image), or on a computer (the full width, only the middle band), a phone (the safe area, the part you can count on) or a TV (the whole image).
5. Download a JPG or PNG under YouTube's 6 MB limit, then upload it (next section).

Using an image editor instead? YouTube's tips say you can make a banner in your favorite photo editing software, and name Canva as a popular choice. Whatever you use, start a 2560 × 1440 canvas, draw a 1544 × 423 box in its middle as a guide (about 508 pixels in from the sides and 509 from the top and bottom), keep every word and logo inside it, and run the background out to all four edges.

Make it match the rest of the channel. YouTube's tips suggest one look across your profile picture and banner, and your thumbnails are the third piece: make them in the same colors with the YouTube thumbnail maker, and see how to make a YouTube thumbnail for their size and rules.

On a computer, in YouTube Studio:

1. Sign in to YouTube Studio.
2. From the menu on the left, select Customization, then Profile.
3. Next to Banner image, click Change and choose your image.
4. To make changes, select a preview and change the crop, then click Done.
5. Click Publish.

On a phone, in the YouTube app: tap your profile picture, then Your channel (View channel on Android), tap Edit, then tap your banner image, choose a photo (or take one) and tap Save. In the YouTube Studio app for iPhone, tap your profile picture, then Edit profile, then your banner image.

The profile picture and video watermark are in the same place, under Customization, then Profile, in YouTube Studio. Official Artist Channels are the exception: their banner shows only on computers and phones, and the one for TV and YouTube Music is set separately, under Profile in YouTube Studio.

• Text outside the safe area. The most common one. A name in the top third is cut off on a computer, and one near a side can be cut off on a phone, though both look fine on a TV. Keep every word inside the middle 1544 × 423.
• Borders, frames and shadows. YouTube's page says not to add “file embellishments (e.g. shadows, borders, and frames)”. A frame drawn around the image is cut through on every device that crops it, so it looks broken rather than framed.
• Too small an image. A 2048 × 1152 upload is accepted, but YouTube recommends 2560 × 1440, especially for TV. Make it at that size, and don't stretch a small logo or photo up to fill it: enlarging adds pixels, not detail.
• A file over 6 MB. A detailed photo saved as a PNG can be. Save it as a JPG, or lower the JPG's quality a little.
• Too much text. The safe area is a short strip. A paragraph, or five social handles, shrinks to nothing on a phone: put the handles in your channel's links instead.
• Thin text on a busy photo. On a phone the banner is small. Use a heavy font, and darken or blur the background behind the words.
• An old schedule. “New videos every Friday” on a channel that last posted in spring tells visitors it's stopped. Change the banner when the schedule changes; YouTube's tips say your branding can change with you.

The banner is one of three branding images, all set in YouTube Studio under Customization, then Profile. The other two follow you further: the profile picture shows on your channel, your videos and your comments, and the watermark sits on your videos.

YouTube's tips say a square or round image works best for the profile picture. Upload one larger than 98 × 98 (YouTube lets you adjust its crop as you upload it), and keep it simple, because that small size is where most people see it. Use the same colors as the banner, so the two read as one channel.

The video watermark shows on your videos in landscape view, on computers and phones, though it can't be clicked on a phone. You choose when: for the last 15 seconds of the video, from a time you pick, or the whole way through. It isn't shown on videos made for kids, and it can only be set on a computer.

A banner works on people who have already found your channel: it tells them what it is and when to come back. Getting them there is the harder part. For a new channel, that takes a steady run of videos YouTube can show to people who don't know you yet, and Shorts are the quickest to make in numbers: a few from every long video you post.

By hand, that means watching each video again for moments that stand on their own, then cutting, reframing and captioning each one. Clyper does those steps from the video's YouTube link: it reads the transcript to find the best moments, cuts each one on whole sentences, frames it 9:16 on whoever's talking and captions every word. You choose how many, up to one for every 2 minutes of video and 30 a video, and post them yourself. See YouTube to Shorts for how it works.

Setting up a channel from scratch? Start with how to start a YouTube channel, then how to get your first 1,000 subscribers.