Sync a YouTube channel with a Channel

Linking a YouTube channel turns a Bluprint Channel into a mirror of what you have already published. Your uploaded videos come in as Ideas, their publish dates land on the calendar as release events, and their thumbnails arrive as thumbnail projects — so your back catalog and your planning workspace live in one place.

Link a YouTube channel to a Channel

A YouTube connection lives on a single Channel, so each Channel can mirror one YouTube channel. This keeps a "Main" Channel pointed at your main upload feed while a "Shorts" or "Podcast" Channel points somewhere else.

1. Open the Channel's settings

   Right-click the Channel tab and choose Edit Channel (or open the tab menu and select it). Scroll to the YouTube Connection section.

2. Pick the channel to link

   Select Link YouTube channel, then choose the YouTube channel you want from the list. Only channels your connected YouTube Studio account can access appear here.

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3. Choose what stays in sync

   Once linked, turn on Auto-sync new videos to import newly published videos automatically. Two sub-options control the side artifacts each imported Idea gets:

   • Release events — add a release event to each Idea from the video's publish date.
   • Thumbnail projects — add a thumbnail project per Idea and refresh its cover when the video's thumbnail changes.

   You can leave auto-sync off and import on demand instead (see below).

How syncing works

When a Channel is linked, Bluprint keeps a private cache of that channel's published videos — each video's title, description, thumbnail, publish date, and top-level stats (views, likes, comments, duration). Everything below reads from that cache.

When videos sync

• Automatically, about once an hour. If Auto-sync new videos is on, a scheduled job pulls anything newly published and backfills it. To stay light on YouTube's API, the sync scans newest-first and stops as soon as it reaches a video it already has, and it refreshes existing video stats on a slower, roughly-daily cadence.
• On demand. You can preview and import your back catalog at any time, even with auto-sync off (see Import your back catalog).

What a synced video becomes

Each new video is turned into a published Idea, automatically linked to its source video. From there:

• A release event is added to the calendar using the video's publish date.
• A thumbnail project is created with the video's thumbnail as its final iteration.

Import your back catalog

Auto-sync handles videos going forward. To pull in videos you published before linking, use the import flow.

1. Open the importer

   Right-click the linked Channel's tab and choose Import videos from YouTube.

2. Pick videos and side artifacts

   Bluprint fetches your uploaded videos that don't yet have an Idea. Every video is selected by default — uncheck any you want to skip, and use the two switches to decide whether to also create release events and thumbnail projects.

3. Import

   Select Import to create a published Idea for each selected video. Videos already linked to an Idea never appear here, so importing is always safe to re-run.

Sync status: synced, paused, and re-syncing

Anything imported from YouTube carries a small YouTube badge that tells you whether it still matches its source video.

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• Synced — the item matches its source video and will keep updating from YouTube.
• Sync paused — the item has drifted, so automatic updates stop. This happens when you edit a synced field yourself, or when you changed the video on YouTube.

Only specific fields are kept in sync, and editing one of them locally is exactly what pauses sync — that way your own changes are never silently overwritten:

Manually link an Idea to a video

Sometimes an Idea you planned by hand is actually the video you just uploaded. Instead of importing a duplicate, link the existing Idea directly to the uploaded video.

1. Open the Idea and start a sync

   Open the Idea, select the menu in the Idea window header, and choose Sync with YouTube video.

2. Choose what to keep aligned

   Decide whether to also sync a release date and a thumbnail project. For each, you can point at an existing release event or thumbnail project on the Idea, or let Bluprint create a new one from the video.

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3. Pick the uploaded video

   Select Choose video and pick the upload to link. Videos already linked to another Idea are marked, so you can avoid pointing two Ideas at the same source by accident.

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4. Start syncing

   Select Start syncing. The Idea's title and description are copied from the video, and the linked release event and thumbnail project stay aligned with the same source going forward.

Common mistakes

Expecting private or unlisted videos to appear the same as public ones

The importer and picker show each video's privacy (Public, Unlisted, Private). All uploads on your channel can be linked, but keep the privacy label in mind when you decide what belongs in your planning workspace.

Editing a synced Idea and wondering why it stopped updating

That is intentional. Editing a synced field (an Idea's title or description, a release date, or a thumbnail's final image) pauses sync for that item so your change sticks. Use the badge to re-sync when you want YouTube's values back.

Linking two Ideas to the same video

You can, but both Ideas will point at one source. The manual picker flags videos that are already synced with another Idea so you can avoid it unless you mean to.

Next step

With a channel linked, your published work and your upcoming plans sit side by side. Try previewing an Idea as it would look on YouTube with YouTube Mockup Generator.