*Updated 1/24/2014
It appears as though YouTube no longer offers the ability to unlink your Google+ account. If I find a way to do this, I will update this post to reflect that.
*Updated 8/15/2013
I have received a lot of questions about how to unlink your Google Plus account from YouTube. *Update – If you are creating a brand new YouTube account, there is no way to unlink it from Google+. As you set up the YouTube page, it will prompt you to set up a Google+ profile or page. You have to set one up or you won’t be able to have a YouTube Channel. I think they started doing this around June of 2013
However, if you setup a YouTube channel before they started doing this, you should still be able to unlink it from Google Plus. Especially if you were prompted to link it after you set up the channel originally. Fortunately, YouTube has made this process a little easier since it first started automatically linking your Google Plus account to your YouTube account.
Why would you want to unlink it? Mostly so you can name it something other than your name or Google Plus channel. For example, when I set up my YouTube channel, since it was automatically linked from Google Plus, the name of my YouTube channel was Stephen Wagner. That’s great, but what if I was setting it up for my business and wanted to name it Katie Wagner Social Media. YouTube doesn’t let you do that unless you unlink your Google Plus account.
Here is how you do it:
The first way, is if you have never logged into YouTube before, a screen will show up and this box will appear.
Click on the link at the bottom that says ‘create a username’. A new box will show up, as shown below. A couple of pieces of advice, and this goes for later as well. Your username cannot be changed, and will also be your URL. Whatever you put in here will not only be a way for you to login to YouTube, but will also be what shows up in the address bar – meaning YouTube.com/username. So, if you are creating this for your business, you want to brand this like any other social media channel or website you have. For example, our company’s YouTube channel is youtube.com/kwsocialmedia. Since this is something you will probably be putting in a lot of places, be sure to think about your branding. Once you put this in there, you can’t change it.
Once you have set the username, skip down to where I show you how to change the name of the channel.
Here is the second way to change it (if the above screen doesn’t show up for you when you login to YouTube).
First, notice that my profile picture and name are showing the same as on my Google Plus account. YouTube automatically put this in there when they linked my accounts.
Click on the ‘Channel Settings’ button, then on the ‘Info and Settings’ tab. This will take you to the screen below. This is normally where you would change the title to your page. However, what is there in it’s place is my Google Plus profile. Now, there is an ‘edit’ button there. However, that is just going to take you to your Google Plus account where you could edit your profile, and the name would change in both places. But that isn’t what we want. We want them to be unlinked so you can change either without affecting the other one.
Instead, cancel out of that and click in the upper right hand corner on your picture. The dropdown menu seen below will appear.
Click on the ‘YouTube Settings’ Link in the bottom left-hand corner of the dropdown menu. It will take you to a new screen and an ‘account information’ box will be in the middle, as shown below.
*Update – in some accounts I have been working on recently, a link is now showing up that says “Disconnect Google+ from YouTube” right above the word “Advanced” on this screen. If you see that, click on that link instead of “Advanced”.
Click on the ‘advanced’ link to the right of your picture. A screen will show up as shown below.
Once here, you want to click on the ‘create username’ link. It will take you to a new screen, which will allow you to create a username. Like I said earlier, this will not only create the login username for your YouTube channel, but it will also create the custom URL for your channel, so be sure to pick one that matches your brand. Once you set your username, you have officially unlinked your Google Plus account from YouTube!
Ok, now that you have set your username, you can now title your channel whatever you want. Your URL can’t be changed, but the title of the channel can. Let me show you what I mean.
First, go back to your Channel. I decided to set my username as TheStephenWagner for this example. As you can see below, the channel name changed from ‘Stephen Wagner’ to ‘TheStephenWagner’.
Since I want it to be named ‘Katie Wagner Social Media’, I need to change the title. Click on the ‘Channel Settings’ button, then on the ‘Info and Settings’ tab. The screen below should show up.
Here, where you see the title ‘TheStephenWagner’, you can now changed that to whatever you want. I changed it to ‘Katie Wagner Social Media’ as shown below. Be sure to click ‘save’.
Now, when I go back to the channel, it shows up as ‘Katie Wagner Social Media’, instead of ‘TheStephenWagner’, or ‘Stephen Wagner’ from my Google Plus account!
I know this is a lot of steps, and I wouldn’t be surprised if you have questions or run into problems. I have set up a lot of YouTube channels and it took me a few times to get it right. Should you have any questions or are seeing something different on your account (YouTube is changing this frequently), please don’t hesitate to reach out to me by commenting below.
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R~Laura
Hi Stephen, do you have any idea or can you explain how to get your google + profile picture to show up in search engine results?
Stephen Wagner
Hello! That is a bit complex, but it has to do with Google Authorship. I found this article that explains more about it, hope this helps! https://managewp.com/google-picture-search-results
Danny
Some very useful Advice regarding Google Plus, Stephen.
The whole issue of Google wanting to link everything “Google” across all web properties, has it’s positive benefits, and also a few downsides, too.
I have a number of Youtube Channels, as well as Websites, and the last thing I really need is having totally “non related websites and channels overlapping.
I do see the positives of setting up Google Authorship, though, for me personally, I only wish to have my main website attached to my Google plus(authorship) profile, and to exclude all other sites and Youtube Channels.
Stephen Wagner
Hi Danny! Thanks for the comment! I agree with you that there are some positives from an SEO standpoint. Personally, I feel that Google has made it very difficult to use YouTube and Google Plus. They are not as user friendly as they used to be and are changing them very frequently. It’s very frustrating.
Kirk
I wish to have my same username, gohopdrummer, for google and youtube, but I wish to have a separate password for each, and I wish to be able to log into one without logging into the other. Is is possible, and how?
Stephen Wagner
Hi Kirk! Great question! I have done a little research to see if what you are trying to do is possible. At this time, I don’t think you will be able to do that. Unfortunately, you can’t have the same username with two different logins as the username is unique. Thank you for reading our blog!
Johnathanmex
Hi there, Stephen, thanks for your help, but when i changed the custom url, the date of joined changed :'(, I joined in 2008, now it says 2013, i’m using the same gmail as my old one (johnathanmex) , how can i have it back 🙁
Stephen Wagner
Thanks for reading and thanks for the question! Unfortunately, I haven’t come across this issue before with simply changing the URL. You can try contacting YouTube directly about the issue to see if they can reset your year to when you actually joined.
Tom Clark
Your instructions don’t work for me. I don’t know if that’s true to all users due to changes by google or not, but the step after clicking “advanced” no longer is an option. That is, your instructions state: “Once here, you want to click on the ‘create username’ link,” but that link is not available. I have searched and searched for a few hours now, and I have no way of disconnecting my youtube and google+ accounts. And in case you’re wondering, my youtube account was set up long before the introduction of google+. Thanks for your efforts. If possible, please update your instructions.
Stephen Wagner
Tom, thank you for your feedback. Unfortunately, it looks as though they have removed the ability to unlink your Google+ account from YouTube… I will continue to look to see if there is a way to be able to do this.
0XxTheGamerGirlxX0
Hey Stephen! I just recently changed my YouTube URL and I had done everything it told me to do. The only problem is my custom URL will not appear on my account. Do have any solutions?
-0XxTheGamerGirlxX0
Stephen Wagner
The Gamer Girl, thanks for Reading! Not sure what you mean when you say your custom URL isn’t appearing on your account. Send me the link to your YouTube channel and I will take a look at it.
Buckbites
Eagerly awaiting your update on decoupling Youtube and Google+. I’ve looked everywhere.
Thanks for staying on top of this!
Buckbites
Stephen Wagner
Hi Buckbites, I will let you know if I find a way to unlink them, but for now it isn’t an option.
zindahi
The option that you have mentioned like “create custom url” “create user name” are not present in the option “Advanced” . What else can i do ?
Stephen Wagner
Hi Zindahi, unfortunately there is no longer an option to unlink your Google+ account from your YouTube account.
Michelle
We have a youtube channel connected to a Google+ profile page. we would rather it connect to our Google+ business page so we can have our username be our business. with all the youtube updates do you know if this is possible and how to do it?
Stephen Wagner
Hi Michelle, thanks for reading and for the question! You might be able to connect them if you make your Google+ profile an admin (or page manager) on the Google+ business page. Once you have done that, there may be a way to link the two. I have never had to fix a situation like that, but that is probably a good start. I would have to be in the account to be able to see what happens once you do that to see if you can choose where your updates are posted. Hope that helps! Stephen
Mehtab Hussain Araeen
Hi Stephen, I am shocked from this new policy. I had a youtube account in past. At that time, there was not such a rule. But I deleted that account. Recently, I made a new Google account. Now, as I was unaware of this recent rule, I made a youtube account with my personal URL. I was thinking if it would still be possible for me to unlink both accounts. But it was not. Now I am in great shock. I don’t want to change my URL. In fact, I can’t change my URL, as I have published my visiting card with the same URL. But I still want to unlink my google+ account from my youtube account. This ny rule is highly disgusting for me. Due you have some suggestion for me.
Stephen Wagner
Hi Mehtab, thanks for reading and for the question! Unfortunately, at this time, there is no way to unlink the two. My suggestion is to get your Google+ page looking nice and be sure to share videos there when you post them to YouTube. It can be beneficial for SEO.
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