YouTube Channel Art Size Guide 2026

Upload YouTube channel art at 2560x1440 pixels to cover the largest display size, but design your actual content, logo, text, and calls to action inside a much smaller 1546x423 pixel safe area at the center. That gap between the full upload size and the safe area is the single trickiest part of this spec: YouTube crops your banner differently depending on whether someone is viewing your channel on TV, desktop, or mobile.

Why one image displays three different ways

YouTube channel art shows up differently across three device types:

• TV: displays the full 2560x1440 image
• Desktop: shows a wide strip roughly 2560x423 pixels across the top
• Mobile: shows only the center 1546x423 pixels

Since mobile shows the smallest slice, the 1546x423 safe area is the only region guaranteed visible everywhere. Anything outside it, meaning your logo, channel name treatment, upload schedule, or any text, needs to sit inside that center zone or it will be cut off for a meaningful share of your visitors.

A practical way to design it

Build your canvas at the full 2560x1440 size, place a 1546x423 guide box centered in the middle, and treat everything inside that box as your real design space. Use the area outside the box for background texture, gradients, or decorative elements only, never text or logos, since that outer area disappears on both desktop and mobile.

File requirements

YouTube accepts JPG, PNG, GIF, and BMP for channel art uploads, with a maximum file size of 6MB. YouTube ultimately serves the final banner as a JPG regardless of what you upload, so PNG is worth using during design for crisp text and graphic edges, converting only at the final export.

Quick reference

Spec	Value
Upload size	2560x1440px
Safe area (must-see content)	1546x423px, centered
Desktop display	~2560x423px strip
Max file size	6MB
Formats accepted	JPG, PNG, GIF, BMP

A common design mistake

Placing your channel logo or a "New videos every Tuesday" style message right at the edge of the full 2560x1440 canvas feels natural since that is the space you have, but it is exactly the content that disappears first on mobile. Every time you finish a banner, ask whether it would still make sense with everything outside the center 1546x423 box removed, since that is effectively what a large share of your visitors will actually see.

Getting your banner right

Test your finished banner against YouTube's own preview tool in Channel Customization before publishing, since it shows you exactly how the crop looks on TV, desktop, and mobile before you commit. Once your channel branding is set, keep your upload schedule consistent through the YouTube scheduler, and check video titles with the YouTube title checker. Create a free account to manage YouTube alongside nine other platforms.