Let’s be real: you’re here because you’re doing research, and you wanna know the best YouTube collab ideas you can use to grow your channel and engage your audience. Here at Grin, we’re all about that, so in this article we’ll be discussing the best ways for you to collaborate with people (in order of effectiveness and difficulty), examples of those collaborations in action, and a way for you to learn more about growing on YouTube.

A Quick Overview of YouTube Collabs

Don’t get ahead of yourself and start looking for YouTube collab ideas if you don’t know enough about collaboration on YouTube yet. If you do, you can skip ahead to the meatiest parts, but if you can stand learning a little bit more, stick around.

Basically, collabs on YouTube are a way for creators to work together. The power of a combined group of people isn’t additive- people working together multiply and are greater than the sum of their parts. Just as this applies to the building of our civilations, it applies all the way down to making great content on YouTube.

Why YouTube Collabs Work

Some of you might be asking the question of intellectuals: Why?

YouTube collabs are so effective because they effectively combine audiences of different creators. In your ideal collaboration, both people are introducing a good portion of their audience to a new creator that they can enjoy, so everyone involved (the creators and the fans) can benefit. There’s a lot more complexity to it than that, of course, and you can learn more about YouTube collabs at the end of the article.

Contrary to what the bands Franz Ferdinand and Sparks would tell you, Collaborations Do Work, and we’re about to give you the best YouTube collab ideas.

---

Good YouTube Collab Ideas

8. Shout Each Other Out

This is as easy as plugging them in your video’s description, but another good way to do it is mentioning them in your video or linking to them at the end.

Examples:

Super Bunnyhop shouting out the Dark Souls community at the end of his critical close-up: 

Film Theory shouting out Did You Know Movies 

 7. Interact In Each Other’s Comments

This is another easy way to collaborate, and it’s most effective if you’re liking, favoriting and commenting on each other’s videos, instead of it being a one-sided thing. This practice is extremely common on all levels of YouTube, from small niche communities to the biggest groups of YouTube stars. In fact, niche YouTubers are more likely to benefit from it, since the cross-promotion is more likely to expose the original audiences to more content they previously didn’t know existed.

---

Great YouTube Collab Ideas

6. Host Each Other’s Videos

This one is considered cheating by some, but is a really effective way for YouTubers to work together. Normally, big channels will do this with smaller channels to give them a deserved boost in views and ratings, but channels of equal size can also do this together. Usually, hosting each other’s videos means taking a particularly good video that someone else made and, with their permission, putting it on your channel with little to no editing done to the video, aside from plugging the original channel at the beginning, end or in the description.

The idea of YouTube collab ideas like this is to expose users to other channels without them even needing to leave your own. This can be extremely effective.

Examples:

NCIX hosting Linus Tech Tips 

NISLT hosting Vorobey’s TF2 Frags 

5. Make Challenge Videos

Challenge videos are great fun, and serve as one of the most popular YouTube collab ideas. This is for a good reason! Think of all the challenges you’ve heard about over the recent years…the ALS Ice Bucket challenge, for instance, went extremely viral while also spreading awareness of an excellent cause. Other popular challenges include the Hot Pepper Challenge.

While these can sometimes be small things between two people or groups of friends, challenges like this can quickly become viral. Do note, however, that some challenges can be hazardous…for instance, the cinnamon challenge is actually quite dangerous.

(Little known fact: the Hot Pepper Challenge was first popularized by a huge collaboration channel in the gaming community, Hot Pepper Gaming. HPG started in mid-2013, but the Hot Pepper Challenge took off in the mainstream in 2014. Such is the power of collaboration!)

Examples:

Original ALS Ice Bucket Challenge: 

Saltine Cracker Challenge:

4. Cameo In Each Other’s Videos

This is fairly straightforward as far as YouTube collab ideas go, but it can also be surprisingly effective. Fans who watch both of you will be fairly excited to see two creators they like sharing the same space, if only as a tease, while those who aren’t initiated will naturally get curious on their own and start digging into you themselves. Not a whole lot of work is involved, but this form of advertising-without-advertising is extremely effective, and can be a fun easter egg for your audiences.

Examples:

Hannah and Grace in ERB

Collection of Voice-only Game Grumps Cameos in Red vs. Blue 

---

The Best YouTube Collab Ideas

3. Create Videos With Matching Themes

Maybe a new game or TV show has come out. Maybe it’s a holiday and you guys have similar ways to share it. Maybe something wild just happened, and you both want to react to it! In these cases, it’s smart to create videos with matching themes that are released around the same time, and can then link to one another. This is a great way to connect your audiences and give them more of what they already enjoyed from your original video.

Examples:

Remi Ashten makes a themed video with Monica Church

Gaming YouTuber shouts out his recent video on DYKG

2. Work On A Single Video Together

The best YouTube collabs are the ones with the most work put into them. Why don’t you and (a) friend(s) work on a big video project that none of you could hope to do alone? Use your combined strengths as content creators to make something amazing!

Examples:

Game Theory collaborates with a smaller, but prominent Zelda YouTuber

Epic Rap Battle finales tend to have A LOT of YouTubers 

1. Work On A Series Together

This is the highest level of YouTube collab ideas, and for good reason. Now, you’re undergoing a series of massive projects together. Hosting doesn’t matter that doesn’t matter too much. What’s important is that you’re putting out your best, and putting it out consistently!

Examples:

Epic Rap Battles started as a collab between just two creators

Game Grumps also started this way

Learn more about getting YouTube collabs

There’s still a lot more to learn about collaborating on YouTube, so you should definitely check out our in-depth article on YouTube collabs. Of course, the best way to start getting collaborations is to start meeting YouTube creators like you.