Kurzgesagt. If you have any interest in science, this is a must watch.

Lockpicking Lawyer

Short videos. Reminder that no lock is impenetrable. Also, April Fool’s Day videos are very special.

Kaptain Kristian

Video essays. No longer in production, high-quality reviews of some cultural artifacts. He’s moved his operation to Curiosity Stream. Made me realize it’s worth it to pay creators directly for their work rather than having advertisers and platforms like YouTube. Now, if only I had money to pay these creators. Aye, there’s the rub.

Every Frame a Painting

Expert film analysis. If it’s not, it sure looks like it is.

CGP Grey

Snarky educational. Fun! The best damn flag contest, best takedown of first-past the post voting, and best reflection on how to go forward after hitting YouTube fame. I still want to know if he and Roman Mars have talked flags.

Kutiman ‐ Thru You

Classic YouTube. 15 years ago, mans took a bunch of other YouTube videos and remixed them into each other, producing meta tracks.

deleted by creator

I’ll second a couple of other things that people have mentioned, like SmarterEveryDay and CGP Grey.

Hmm. What would I consistently watch new material on?

• MontemayorChannel

General-audience military history. It’s not especially flashy, and you’ll see typos and such, but it consistently shows maps, which is somewhere that I think a lot of military history stuff falls over. And the guy has read the material for the stuff he covers, at least the stuff that I’m reasonably familiar with. There are much larger military history channels out there, and much blingier ones, but I’d rate this well for actually helping someone accurately understand the material covered. He does a good job of highlighting what I think decent books on the subject matter consider the important, salient bits. I’d say that he’s probably reading – and understanding – the major recommended books on a battle prior to doing a video on it. I’d recommend his videos on battles over any commercial documentaries that I’ve seen.

There are other military history channels that I do watch, but I think that of them, that’s probably the one I’d recommend being worthwhile as a watch the most.

Drachinifel – does naval history, especially gun-era stuff and British stuff – but while Drachinifel is pretty prolific, I wouldn’t rank his output as highly; he’s basically taking some high-level stuff from a quick read and putting it in video format. He’s not doing all that much reading per video. But he’s got a lot of stuff.

The Operations Room also favors maps, but I feel like they tend to pull more of their material from personal accounts from individuals than I’d like.

Kings And Generals has covered a lot of different conflicts, is flashier, also puts stuff on maps, but I’ve definitely seen stuff on there that I’d call erroneous. I’d watch something from them due to the scope of their material, but take it with a grain of salt.

Hmm.

I don’t really follow channels much, repeatedly intentionally come back to anyone. Like, to have a Web analogy, there are websites out there that I like, but very few to which I’d subscribe to an RSS feed, because even for places that have good content, I rarely want to watch a high proportion of anything that they’ve done.

I can’t think of anyone that does software that I’d recommend watching (or, honestly, in general, video for that). I haven’t been all that blown away by video for international affairs stuff, not to the point that I’d explicitly recommend someone.

• theslowmoguys does a lot of well-filmed very slow motion stuff. I wouldn’t go back to see something just because they’ve put it out, but they’ve got some of the better slow-motion footage of different things that I’ve seen. Fun watch.

• Oh, forgottenweapons. This is pretty well-known in the firearms world, so it’s probably not a huge surprise to people who are interested in firearms. It originally focused on unusual firearms mechanisms, but I think that they’ve done a video on darn near every firearm out there now, so it’s kind of a nice place to get a video overview from an informed person of most firearms, short bit history, highlights unusual mechanisms of the thing. I definitely would not go out and try to watch through this whole thing unless you are some kind of absolutely rabid firearms mechanism person, but it consistently has good-quality, informed material. There’s a [email protected] community on the Threadiverse.

• PerunAU is also probably pretty well-known. Guy in defense economics, good for a level-headed, high-level look at the Russia-Ukraine conflict. Shows a series of Powerpoint slides. If he comes out with a new video, I’d watch it; he generally doesn’t waste viewer time, and insofar as my knowledge extends, the information he puts out is pretty solid. I don’t have the knowledge to evaluate the validity of his opinions, but he’s pretty good at explicitly stating that something is or is not his opinion. There’s been a lot of people making a lot of videos on the conflict, and I think that he’s one of the more-worthwhile people to pay attention to.

I feel kinda bad to heavily list military- or weapons- related stuff, as I certainly watch plenty of other stuff on YouTube, but honestly, while I watch other material, most of the cases where I think I’d watch new material from a particular individual falls into those categories. Like, there are channels spanning a wide range of things, that have put out great content, that I think is interesting, but they also put out a whole lot of other stuff that I’m not interested in. I might recommend a particular video, but not the whole channel.

EDIT:

• primitivetechnology9550. Guy goes out into the woods with nothing but his shorts and just using what’s available, constructs a “technology tree”, starting with something like a stone axe and moving up to iron production and increasingly-sophisticated structures. Pretty well-known, but I’ve enjoyed every video I’ve ever seen on there.

Not counting music, I assume - I have a gazilion artists I love if anyone’s interested.

As for actual Content with a capital C:

• PhilosophyTube Extremely interesting, well-researched and entertaining presentation of a wide range of philosophical and sociopolitical topics. From the UK.

• Shaun Ditto, though with a different angle and a Northern accent.

• Contrapoints Ditto, but American and quite a bit more… theatrical. Quite a strong focus on gender and transgender issues; check out her video on J. K. Rowling for one of the best treatments of the topic.

• Dr. Geoff Lindsey - Linguistics and phonology stuff, deep dives into pronunciation, fascinating as fuck.

• Middle Eats Really damn good middle-eastern cooking channel, no-nonsense presentation.

• Brian Lagerstrom - Baking / cooking - good recipes, sensible treatment.

• J. Kenji López-Alt of Serious Eats fame - damn good cook, nice guy.

• Tom Bates Creator of Nigel and Marmalade. Dumb, stoopid, awesome.

• Adam Millard - The Architect of Games - video essays on gaming

• Noodle - very funny animated video essays on gaming

• Ice Cream Sandwich - stoopid funny little cartoons about dumb shit.

• Jaiden Animations Animated little essays about stuff, she must be protected at all costs. See for instance Things about Relationships I wish someone told me about.

• Tom Scott has finished up his Things You Might Not Know series, but there’s like a decade of them and they’re amazing. Little investigative videos on everything from programming to wasp farming. You need to watch all of them.

• Taylor Tries Videos on juggling. I have the hugest talent-crush.

Claire__ Saffitz x Dessert Person

Baker/ pastry chef that makes all sorts of tasty treats. Content is largely educational giving you tips and tricks on what she’s doing and why so you can replicate her recipe more easily.

Binging with Babish

Started out as one dude recreating food from films and shows and has expanded to having a dedicated anime food creator, doing fun food mashups for sports things, redoing episodes that he messed up on, and still doing food from films and shows.

Lemmino

I’m surprised no one mentioned this channel yet. Previously known for making top 10 facts of everything, but has since transitioned into long form documentary of mysteries. He takes a long time between videos, but its always an instant click whenever he uploads. Does his own research, cites them, makes the background music and all of the animations for it. Honeypot for react channels too.

Fortnine

Motorcycle related videos. Does some motorcycle reviews, but the explanation type videos they mostly do are awesome. Even if you’re not a motor head, you can always learn/enjoy something from their videos. If not the knowledge and physics, then the excellent videography and story telling Ryan puts in there.

Technology Connections

The Youtube Appliance guy. I kid, but he does excellent videos delving into tech in general appliances or retro stuff. One of his best videos is about dishwasher detergents, so good he had to make 2 more follow up videos about it. Seriously, go give it a watch.

History of the Universe is exactly what it sounds like. Amazing channel!

ScienceClic English is based on the German channel original, and covers in depth science topics, narrated by a truly stellar individual.

PBS Space Time is simply stunning science coverage that’ll melt your brain.

mapreadingcompany - navigation plus funny wierd facts

explainingcomputers - explains computers

paulsellers - hand tool woodworking

robwords - english language

citynerd - deadpan humour and sarcasm about cities

astonishingglasgow - local hisory about places in Glasgow

Bigtime

is an awesome newer car and motorcycle channel, they split off from donut to go do their own creative stuff after donut go bought by a big soulless media company

Fortnine

is an amazing motorcycle youtube channel with absurd production quality and directing often worthy of full length documentaries

Berm peak

is a super well produced mountain biking and bikes channel

Lab Muffin Beauty Science

If you’re into science based skincare I absolutely adore her, she has a chemistry PhD and a specialization in cosmetic chemistry. She spends a lot of time debunking baseless skincare marketing which I don’t really need since everything I know about skincare I learned from her and various other science focused youtubers, but I absolutely adore her informative videos that are guides to various aspects of skincare, or an exploration of how to competently interpret research

Adam savage’s Tested

channel is a lot of fun if you like maker content, he’s just as energetic and charismatic of a character as he was back on Mythbusters

Hybrid calisthenics

is a wonderful exercise fitness and wellness channel where the guy running it is just an earnest, kind, compassionate human being who offers advice that meets people where they are and helps them progress, regardless of their current ability level. He went viral a while back for a video talking about how you can do exercise at any level, even if you’ve literally never done a pushup in your life, where he demonstrates modified versions of bodyweight exercises that make them more accessible, or even more difficult so that people can work their way up to their goals from any starting point. People fell in love with his personality and attitude of compassion.

My absolute favorites for cooking are:

Adam Ragusea

does an amazing job of making recipes realistic and approachable for home cooking, and his background as a journalist results in incredibly high quality research videos that are unbelievably informative

internet shaquille

unprotentious while focusing on technique, has a fantastic delivery style, it’s hard to describe exactly what makes him special, but the videos are phenomenal and he often gives great life advice

J Kenji Lopez alt

the goat. Super knowledgable, especially regarding the science of cooking, and is a well respected name in recipe development. His videos are him with a gopro camera strapped to his head while he prepares the food and talks about it’s origin, how he likes to make it, etc. Its like having an expert demonstrate for you in their home kitchen while casually chatting about all the knowledge they have to share about a given recipe

Chinese cooking demystified

the absolute best source for traditional chineese cooking, and food history lessons to boot. I love their delivery style, and their videos always give a ton of historical and cultural context and are a joy to watch)

Lemme know if you’d like more food youtubers, these are my absolute faves though, and all offer very different perspectives on food (sometimes disagreeing with eachother) while usually teaching at least as much about technique, how to approach cooking, and their own personal philosophy when developing recipes as they do the specific recipe itself.

Brian David Gilbert

makes a wide range of bizarre nonsense and I adore him. Comedy sketches, horror short film kinda stuff, incomprehensible fever-dreams, a guide to the united states health insurance mess that somehow manages to be as funny as it is depressing, goofy music, unironically wonderfull music, recipies. He used to make polygon’s unhinged video series called unraveled, his personal channel is even better and even more unhinged

Ben Felix - Finance, investing etc. He’s a professional working in the field, never suggests specific stocks or crypto and always refers to sources for his claims. Be very skeptical of all finance and economy suggestions.

Two Cents - Personal Finance (No suggestions for specific stocks or crypto)

Adam Something

Technology Connections

Tom Nicholas - Long form video essays

Polymatter

I’m a big fan of Emily the Engineer. She’s a similar chaotic energy as early Michael Reeves but less directly focused on “offensive ideas” or “things to hurt your friends”. The creativity behind both the projects and the videos is top notch.

Chef Jean-Pierre, I just adore him

City Nerd

Not Just Bikes

Oh the Urbanity

RMTransit

Rob Robinson

Urbanism + transport transition + housing, …I like geography, cities, trains and environmentalism.

Cody’sLab

Geology, chemistry, Martian LARP in Utah, mining, …I like ancient, low frequency, high effort, hobbyist YT channels. Will it charcoal?

Primitive Technology

Hobbyist, Bacterial Iron Age, Soothing. How many people can lite up a fire with two dry sticks and some dried moss in half a minute? Turn on the subtitles.

Practical Engineering

Civil Engineering, I like infrastructure + it being explained.

Earthling Ed

Veganism, I’m vegan.

The Post-Apocalyptic Inventor

Machine restauration, Anti-write off business, I like repairs and machine shop culture.

Untitled Burial

Witch House label, I like Witch House.

Pop Culture Detective

Extreme low frequency feminist video essaying, Clever person.

Brick Technology makes cool mechanisms out of Lego to solve some simple problems