Google Takeout

What this page is for

Mike: export all videos off YouTube so a backup exists even if the channel cannot be kept. About 20 Brand Accounts hang off one Google login. That number is fine — YouTube documents up to 100 channels per Google account. 20 is not a special case.

Two different Takeout jobs live here. Don’t mix them in one export.

Quick pick

True masters are files you kept before upload. Takeout / Studio / yt-dlp are copies of what YouTube still has. Download and verify before any channel delete or handoff.

1. Google Takeout (official bulk)

Google’s data export. Uploaded videos come back as original files for many recent uploads, or high-quality compressed MP4 (H.264 + AAC) for older ones — plus metadata, comments, playlists if you leave those checked.

One channel

1. Open takeout.google.com signed in as the Google account that owns the Brand Accounts.
2. Do not look for bulk export in Studio Settings → Channel → Advanced settings. That panel is ads, captions, clips, quality enhancements, and third-party AI training. There is no “download all videos” control there.
3. Official bulk export is still takeout.google.com (or Google Account → Data & privacy → Download your data). Switch the YouTube identity first on youtube.com (avatar → Switch account), then open Takeout. Studio’s channel settings modal does not pass the Brand Account into Takeout. Cold Takeout often has no picker and dumps the default channel.
4. Click Deselect all.
5. Check only YouTube and YouTube Music.
6. Click All YouTube data included → keep Videos (add playlists / comments / history only if you actually want them).
7. Click Next step.
8. Delivery: email link is fine. Frequency: Export once. File type: .zip. Max size: 10–50 GB so huge channels split cleanly.
9. Create the export. Hours to days. Download promptly (links often last ~7 days). Store outside Google (disk / Bunny / another cloud).

Twenty Brand Accounts (the real work)

Official and supported. Annoying because Takeout is per selected YouTube identity, not “all my channels in one zip.”

1. Spreadsheet: handle, Brand Account name, video count, export date, zip location, verified? (Y/N).
2. For each row: switch into that Brand Account → YouTube-only Takeout → label the zip with the handle.
3. Don’t bundle Drive, Gmail, or Photos in the same run.
4. One export at a time until you know how big a typical channel is.
5. Phone verification can get stingy if you create/verify many new channels at once. 20 existing ones under one login is the documented model (cap is 100).

Shared login means shared security and usually one AdSense payout path. That is independent of Takeout.

What you get

• Large channels → multiple zips. Download every part.
• Good enough to re-upload; not always the camera-original master for old videos.
• Most complete official archive of the channel’s YouTube-side data.

Field note: no picker, wrong pile of MP4s (Aug 2026)

Starting at takeout.google.com did not offer a Brand Account chooser. The archive came back as a folder of product-how-to videos (ceiling fans, air purifiers, bathtub/odor explainers) — that was one owned channel (CleanCrispAir), not the Handshake / SkyInclude channel we were in Studio for. Keep that dump; label it CleanCrispAir.

Studio Settings → Channel → Advanced settings is ads, captions, clips, quality enhancements, and third-party AI training. There is no bulk video download there. Official bulk export is still Takeout (identity-blind unless you switch on youtube.com first) or yt-dlp pointed at the channel ID in the Studio URL.

CLI listed the intended channel at ~595 videos + 4 Shorts. The Mac’s internal disk was ~99% full (~6 GB free), so the dump has to go to a real backup drive with hundreds of GB free — not the boot SSD. An already-connected external volume was failing copies; don’t start a 595-video pull until writes actually land and stay.

# One of YOUR channels (public Videos tab)
yt-dlp -f "bv*+ba/b" --merge-output-format mp4 \
  --download-archive "./archives/@YourHandle.txt" \
  -o "./%(uploader)s/%(upload_date)s - %(title)s [%(id)s].%(ext)s" \
  "https://www.youtube.com/@YourHandle/videos"

# Several of YOUR channels: one URL per line in channels.txt
# https://www.youtube.com/@HandleA/videos
# https://www.youtube.com/@HandleB/videos
yt-dlp -f "bv*+ba/b" --merge-output-format mp4 \
  --download-archive "./archives/all.txt" \
  -o "./%(uploader)s/%(upload_date)s - %(title)s [%(id)s].%(ext)s" \
  -a channels.txt

# Private / unlisted on a Brand Account you are logged into
yt-dlp --cookies-from-browser chrome \
  -f "bv*+ba/b" --merge-output-format mp4 \
  "https://www.youtube.com/@YourHandle/videos"

Field notes · August 2026 · Official Takeout per Brand Account · yt-dlp is third party · 20 channels under one Google login is allowed