Download a backup of your YouTube Brand Account channel and Google+ Page data

If you are using a Brand Account identity for your YouTube Channel or Google+ Page, you can - and should - use Google Takeout to download an archive of your content. Google+ Page content needs to be downloaded before consumer Google+ shuts down on April 2, 2019.

A Brand Account lets you have a brand, business, organization identity on Google that is different than your personal Google Account identity. Brand Accounts can have multiple Owners and Managers, who sign in to their own Google Account to manage the Brand Account and any Google services on that Brand Account. Currently the only Google products that officially support a Brand Account identity are YouTube, Google+ and Google Photos.

Google Takeout lets you create an archive of your content stored by Google. If your data is important to you, it's a good idea to create an archive periodically:

Consumer Google+ will shut down by April 2, 2019 and all Google+ Page content will be deleted (NOTE: your Brand Account and associated YouTube channel will NOT be deleted)
You might otherwise lose access to your account
Your account could be suspended
You might accidentally delete a video, post or image
Google might change the file formats for the archive, with more or different data

How to create an archive of your Brand Account's YouTube and Google+ data

Sign in to Google as the Owner of the Brand Account
Open Google Takeout (click here to download YouTube and Google+ data)
Click your profile photo at top right and select your Brand Account identity
Select which Google product data you want to archive
Customize your archive format and delivery method (download or cloud storage)
When the archive is ready, download the content to your computer

Get detailed instructions below

Download an archive of your YouTube channel on a Brand Account
Download an archive of your Google+ Page (and see places you can import the data)

Download an Archive of your YouTube Channel on a Brand Account

While YouTube lets you download an MP4 file of your videos from your video manager, those downloads are limited to lower resolution 360p or 720p, depending on the size of the video.

If you use Google Takeout instead, your videos are either exported in their original format within the first 6 months after upload. After 6 months, they may be downloaded as a high quality compressed version (MP4 files with H264 video and AAC audio).

The other YouTube data you can export:

Chats
Watch History
Your Comments
Your Community Contributions
Your Live Chat Messages
Playlists
Subscriptions
Videos

The default is to download all of your data.

Note that you will not be able to download comments posted by other people.

Download an archive of your Brand Account YouTube Channel data using Google Takeout

1. Sign in to Google as the Owner of your YouTube channel's Brand Account

You can check to see if you are signed in as the Owner in your YouTube channel's Advanced Settings (www.youtube.com/account_advanced). That will show if you are signed in as Owner, Manager or into your account directly.

2. Open Google Takeout (takeout.google.com)

If you only want to archive your YouTube channel data, you can start here:

https://takeout.google.com/settings/takeout/custom/youtube

3. Click your Profile Photo at top right so the menu opens

4. Select your Brand Account from the list

If you don't see your Brand Account, click All your Brand Accounts and then click the Brand Account name to return to Takeout.

5. Select the Google Products you want to archive.

Toggle the switch to the right of YouTube. You can also select other Google products to archive (although your Brand Account isn't likely to have data other than for Google Photos and Google+).

6. Optional: Select which YouTube data you want to archive.

The default is to create an archive of everything. Click the down arrow to the right of YouTube to see the option to customize.

Click Select specific data to choose which data you want.

You can also choose the file format for Subscriptions: OMPL (RSS) or JSON.

7. Click Next to see the options to customize your archive format

8. Customize your archive format

File type: .zip or .tgz

.zip is the default and should be openable on almost any device.

Archive size (max): 1GB, 2GB, 4GB, 10GB, 50GB

Your device may have difficulty opening larger files, and they will take longer to download. If your total archive is larger than the max archive size, it will be split into multiple files to download.

Delivery method: Direct download (link sent over email), Dropbox, Box, Microsoft OneDrive (Google Drive is not an option for Brand Accounts)

I think ideally at least one copy of your archive should be saved on an offline hard drive, one you can access even if you lost access to all your online accounts. However, if you only have a phone or tablet, it likely doesn't have enough storage for your archive. If that is the case, select one of the cloud storage options. You may need to pay for additional storage depending on your archive size.

9. Click Create Archive

The archive creation process can take some time if you have a lot of content. Google will send you an email notification when the archive is ready.

10. Download your archive files

f you did not choose the option to use one of your cloud data storage accounts, you will have to return to download your files. There should be a link in the email notification, but if that does not work.

> Sign in to Takeout as the Brand Account Owner

> Click your profile photo at top right to switch to your Brand Account

> Click Manage Archives

> Download your content

Make sure you are viewing the Manage Archives page with your Brand Account identity.

11. Access your archived content

Once you have downloaded your archives, you can access the data:

1. Unzip all of the archive files

2. Combine all the archive files into a single folder

3. Open index.html in your favorite web browser

4. Navigate through your content

Create an Archive of your Google+ Page data

Since Google+ for consumers is shutting down on April 2, 2019, you should create an archive of the data you want to keep before then. Note that Google+ posts and profiles will be unavailable after consumer Google+ shuts down, so don't be surprised if the links to Google+ content in the archive are broken after that date. Watch my tutorial video for an overview:

You can download:

Google+ Stream

Posts you created, including comments
+1’s, comments you posted and other activity
Metadata from Collections you created
Events you created or were invited to
Photos you shared in your posts and comments

Google+ Circles

First name, last name, nickname, Google+ profile URL

Google+ Communities (if you are an owner or moderator)

Names and links to Google+ profiles of community owners, moderators, members, applicants, banned members, and invitees
Links to posts shared with the community (but not the posts themselves)
Community metadata, including community picture, community settings, content control settings, your role, and community categories

+1s on external websites

Links to articles, blog posts, and other content that you +1’d (this feature was discontinued in 2017)

If you have shares a lot of photos or other images on Google+ the total archive size my be very large. You may want to create separate archives of each type of Google+ data separately so that you have some smaller files.

There are some sites that let you import your posts from the Google Takeout archive:

MeWe has a Google+ importer

There are also some third party services that an export data in a more user-friendly format or import your Takeout data:

Friends+Me Google+ Exporter (export to WordPress or Blogger format.)
LifeCloud Google+ Importer (import Google+ Communities, Posts, Collections.)
Romain Vialard's Google+ migration tool (uses the Google+ API, which may intermittently fail as soon as January 28.)

Download an archive of your Google+ Page's data using Google Takeout

1. Sign in to Google as the Owner of your Google+ Page's Brand Account

You can check to see if you are signed in as the Owner on the Brand Account's Details page:8

> Open your Brand Accounts list (https://myaccount.google.com/brandaccounts)

> Click the Brand Account name to open the Details page

> On the Details page click Manage Permissions

> Make sure you are signed in as an Owner of your Page's Brand Account

2. Open Google Takeout (takeout.google.com)

If you only want to archive your Google+ Page data, you can start here:

https://takeout.google.com/settings/takeout/custom/circles,plus_one,plus_communities,stream

3. Click your Profile Photo at top right so the menu opens

4. Select your Brand Account from the list

If you don't see your Brand Account, click All your Brand Accounts and then click the Brand Account name to return to Takeout.

5. Select the Google Products you want to archive.

Toggle the switch to the right of the Google+ product options. You can also select other Google products to archive (although your Brand Account isn't likely to have data other than for Google Photos and YouTube).

6. Optional: Select which Google+ data you want to archive.

The default is to create an archive of everything. Click the down arrow to the right of each Google+ product to see the option to customize.

Click Select specific data to choose which data to download and the format of that data. If you want your data in multiple formats, you can create more than one archive. Options include:

Google+ Circles: vCard, HTML, Comma Separated Values (CSV), JSON

Google+ Communities:

> Select Communities from those you own or manage

> Select JSON or HTML format

Google+ Stream:

> Select data from Posts, Photos, Activity Log (including comments), Collection Metadata or Events