Customize an Embedded YouTube Video With Just a Few Clicks

YouTube makes is very easy for you to embed video (that is, put video) on nearly any web page you want. What a lot of people don't realize is that YouTube also lets you customize the experience that your readers see. For example, you can change the size of the window that will play the video. Heck, if you really get into it, you can change nearly two dozen parameters. But let's assume you want to embed a video and just make a few simple customizations.

Once you've found the video you'd like to embed, look for the share button that is under the video (and also under the video's headline). The button looks like one dot splitting into two. Once you click that a new, horizontal menu will appear and one of the options will be embed. After you click embed, you'll see a long string of computery-looking text. Don't worry about what it means, it's just the code you'll be pasting into your web page.

Now that you have the code, click the Show More button that's located right under the code. Here you'll find some options that will customize the video on your site. As of publication date, the options were: Video size, show suggested video when the video finishes, show player controls, show the video title and player action, and whether to enable privacy-enhanced mode (don't worry, the site will explain what that means if you don't know).

YouTube actually allows for more customizing if you know how to alter the code. Most of us don't know how to customize the code, but we found a site that let's you customize it to your heart's content. We don't control the site or guarantee the code it generates, but it worked for us. Here's how to super-customize a video for embedding. One of the really great features is that you can set a start and end time for the video so you can show your reader precisely what you want them to see. That not only save you from explaining to your readers when the good stuff starts, it also saves your reader time (and potential frustration).

Oh, if you're curious, you can see all the different parameters that are customizable right from the horse's mouth.