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Like Twitter, YouTube also supports custom backgrounds and color themes so you can completely change the look of your YouTube channel in minutes and make it stand out- see example.

The unique thing about YouTube is that it supports transparent backgrounds so you can be a lot more creative with your themes. And while there are no statistics to support this, people are more likely to subscribe to your YouTube videos if the landing page looks more professional.

Watch the following 101 video to see how easy it is to customize the theme and other parts of your YouTube channel.

How to Create YouTube Backgrounds?

If you are the creative type, you can build a custom background for your YouTube channel in three easy steps. I learned the trick from YouTube user Sammy.

Step 1. Go to you YouTube channel and log out of your Google Account so that you don’t see that “Edit Channel” bar on YouTube.

Step 2. Maximize the browser screen and press Ctrl-0 to remove zoom, if any. Then hit F11 to hide all the menu bars and the scrollbars.

Step 3. Press Print-Screen to take a screen capture of the maximized YouTube channel page and then paste this image from the clipboard into Photoshop or GIMP or Paint.NET or any other image editing program.

Step 4. That becomes your starting template. You know where the different elements of the page will appear so you can tweak the design accordingly.

If you don’t want to do all the hard work, just download Sammy’s readymade template(PSD). And you are looking for a slightly wider YouTube template to support bigger monitors, use this PSD instead courtesy YouTube user Joe.

Where Can I Download YouTube Themes?

Here are some of best sites where you can download YouTube themes for free. Some themes may use custom font names and color schemes so you’ll have to key-in thoseRGB values manually.

1. MyTubeDesign.com – The site has an excellent collection of YouTube templates neatly arranged in categories and you can download most of these templates for free. If you are a YouTube partner, MyTubeDesign has channel designs for you as well.

2. YTLayouts.net – This is another useful site with a good collection of YouTube layouts. Unlike MyTubeDesign, all designs on the YTLayouts website are free for download. The site also has a collection of Photoshop tutorials in case you want to do them on your own.

3. BackgroundTube.com – They do have some good templates for your YouTube channel but make sure you avoid the ones that require you to fill some sort of surveys before showing the download links.

Once your new design is ready, grab some YouTube buttons to promote your video channel. And if you know of any other site that offers YouTube backgrounds for free, please let me know in the comments.