Brand Account

What is a Brand Account on YouTube?

A Brand Account is a Google account for a business or brand that can be linked to a YouTube channel. When a channel is linked to one, several people can manage it from their own Google Accounts, and nobody needs a shared username or password.

Google now recommends channel permissions in YouTube Studio instead of Brand Account roles, because password sharing and broad access create security and privacy risks.

Why a Brand Account matters for creators

A channel that several people touch — an editor, a designer, a manager — needs access that can be granted and taken away. A Brand Account does that at the account level: each person signs in with their own Google Account and gets a role.

The role also decides how much someone sees. On a channel in the YouTube Partner Program, revenue data is part of that decision.

Important: if you delete the primary owner account linked to your channel, the channel is deleted too.

Brand Account roles

A Brand Account has 3 roles you can assign, and an account must have 1 primary owner:

• Owner — can take the most actions and controls who manages the account. Owners and the primary owner have no limitations.

• Manager — can use Google services that support Brand Accounts, for example posting videos on YouTube. A manager can't join or leave an MCN, invite other users, transfer the channel or have it transferred to them (except by the primary owner), delete the channel, or make a purchase.

• Communications manager — can do the same actions as a manager, but can't take any actions on YouTube.

To set yourself as primary owner you must have been an owner for 7 days or more.

Channel permissions in YouTube Studio

Channel permissions are the newer way to share access, and they are managed exclusively through YouTube Studio. There are 7 roles: Owner, Manager, Editor, Editor (Limited), Viewer, Viewer (Limited) and Subtitle Editor. The full breakdown of what each one can do is on YouTube's Help page.

To move a Brand Account over: open studio.youtube.com signed in as the primary owner, then click Settings, Permissions, Move Permissions and Invite. Fill in Email and Access for each person and click Save. Everyone you invite gets an email to accept.

People invited this way can manage the channel on YouTube and in YouTube Studio, on both computer and mobile — including replying to comments as the channel and reading Analytics. They can't manage it through the YouTube APIs.

How to check who manages your Brand Account

1. In a browser, go to the Brand Accounts section of your Google Account.

2. Under "Your Brand Accounts", select the account you want to manage.

3. Tap Manage permissions to see everyone who can manage the account, owners included.

To add someone, choose Invite new users, enter their email addresses, pick a role below their names, then tap Invite and Done. Running a second channel alongside your main one shifts who needs which role — our guide to launching and managing a second YouTube channel covers the trade-offs.