Q&A for How to Make Your YouTube Video Private

This would be applicable if the video shows the real world such as the park, school, neighborhood, or any other landmark or identifying place. Some people upload personal videos of their family and those videos can reveal private details like where their house is or what school they go to. The reason why these videos are private is because they don't want people finding where they live and/or they're shy and don't want strangers seeing them and possibly doing something harmful.

They might not want everyone in the world to see it, but at the same time they want to keep the comment section open. (Changing a video to private always disables the comments.)

Yes.

They're private, so there's no way to know unless they reveal it.

Those viewings are from you. When you watch your own video, you add views to it. The lock icon setting for a video means "private," so click that option on the video's visibility settings if you don't want the wrong people watching.

It might have accidentally given away their home location.

Lots of things can personally identify someone. It doesn't have to be real stuff like peoples' faces or their home address. It can be a combination of info such as their favorite animal and their nickname or slightly unusual name. If the video takes place at someone's home, it can possibly reveal where they live, especially if it's outside. A video outside could reveal a landmark giving away what city they live in. This can be a bit dangerous if they live in a small town. It could also reveal the uploader's face or something else that they didn't realize anyone could find (as a public video).

They may have been embarrassed by the feedback and become too shy to reveal it again. They may even have a fear of being publicly humiliated somewhere over it. Changing a video to private disables comments, too.

That's a peculiar reason to change a video to private. Normally, private videos are personally identifying or embarrassing. Maybe the video contained something embarrassing/private to them that other people wouldn't realize. Maybe they were bullied over it in some way. Some people are sensitive and may hide their videos for fear of getting hate comments.

Yes. Livestreams have the same visibility settings as any other video. Just like any other private video, you can invite up to 50 people by typing their email addresses in a list, and they will be invited to watch the live video. You'd also have to meet the special requirements to get the ability to livestream, before you can do so.

That depends on the subject and contents of the video and how personal it is. If it has the potential to reveal your exact location (such as your neighborhood or your school, or even the exact house you live in) or other private details, it should be private. If your family members or friends appear in them, ask them first. Humiliating or sexually embarrassing videos should generally be private as well.

The most common reason is because the video was added to the playlist before that video was changed to private. If it is a personal playlist, then that video is in the playlist so the approved people can access it quicker, and simply because it goes with what the playlist is about.

No, private videos are very secure. Other people can't watch your private video unless their email address is on an approved list. The exception being if they're physically near you or near the person who has access to it, as in they'd look over your shoulder while you're uploading/playing the video or they sneak into your unlocked account when you're not looking. Make sure you trust whoever is watching it and don't leave your account open or watch it when the wrong people could see it.

You can do this in your channel's dashboard for an existing video or right when uploading a new video. When you click "Share Privately" you just type the email addresses of the people who you want to see the video.

Personal information isn't the only reason why a video on YouTube would be private. It may be humiliating to them in another way, or it can identify their online persona in a way that can ruin their reputation. They might also not be able to decide on the right title or description for the video, which could be why it is private until they can make a decision. Another reason why it may be changed to private is because of copyright reasons, if it violates copyright it may be locked to private, if not deleted entirely.

Some people don't really know anyone else who they are comfortable sharing it with, so they just watch it by themselves.

It's the only way you can safely send the video to them. YouTube doesn't have a private messaging system, so the email is the closest thing.

They may have accidentally included it in a public or unlisted playlist, or embedded it to a public page outside of YouTube. Those are the only places you can find an unlisted video as those types of videos don't show up in search results.

A likely reason would be they are no longer embarrassed by the content or they have now just decided on finishing its title/description. It can take some time for someone to get over being awkward/humiliated about a certain thing they do. Some people upload videos privately first, because they're not sure if something on the video should be edited or not, and release them publicly when they are finished with it.

You'd have to find them in your channel's dashboard. On your channel, click "Manage videos", or click your icon at the top of the screen and click "YouTube Studio", and you will see every video you have uploaded. You can add a private video to a playlist, including right in the middle of uploading it. They will show up in a playlist, but to those who aren't allowed to watch it, it will just show as "Private video" and clicking it will result in a blank screen.

Yes. That's a common reason for a video being temporarily private. Sometimes people are momentarily too busy to work on the description/title, so they upload it as private until they're ready to work on it.

You can add up to 50 email addresses for viewers who can watch the private video. To remove certain email addresses, just click the X button next to the name of the address and they'll be removed from the list.

It could be for any number of reasons. For example, private videos are usually personal content. Family videos/photos, school projects, and the like are often kept private. They usually contain information that could give away the location of the uploader or anyone else in the video. Many of them are only important or valuable to a small group of insiders, such as family members, friends, or classmates. Some people upload private videos for only themselves to view. Private videos can also be used for collaborations/projects between a few people to work on before the project is finished.

A person might want to make this change to keep the video's content open to themselves only, or perhaps viewable by family or friends only. For example, they might have made the video public in error, they might not want other people seeing their children or family members, they might be tired of receiving feedback from a troll or they might have accidentally included information that could reveal their location, personal details or something else that they want kept private.

No. Private videos don't have a comment section and there's no setting to change that. There's no way to add comments to a private video even with the certain people you shared it with. If you want comments on a video that's not available to the public, change the video settings to unlisted.

Go to your channel's dashboard and click "Videos" in the sidebar to the left. Change the video's visibility level to "private" and type their email addresses in the box. They will get a notification in their inbox that has the link to the video. That's the only way someone can view a private video.