Need some advice! (making a physics YouTube channel)

[Mysticphysicss]

Good evening, folks! I have been anticipating making a physics YouTube channel that involves teaching the subject (classical physics) , but I would like to on how to make my channel stand out and be more effective than others. Should I also provide experiments?

 

[berkeman]

Welcome to PF.

What is your academic background in Physics?

 

[Mysticphysicss]

I'm currently an Undergraduate student at CUNY, majoring in physics (Sophomore), and a math tutor as well in my uni. I know it's not much experience, but that is my goal as I expand my career into becoming a Physics professor. I want to make Physics fun to learn for people in/outstide of STEM.

 

[berkeman]

I want to make Physics fun to learn for people in/outstide of STEM.

If you haven't done so already, have a look through the threads in our Educators and Teachers forum. There are lots of good threads on different ways to present physics material and some good discussions on how to improve things. You can see this long thread started by @TensorCalculus for example:

Thread 'I want to help Physics education. What should I do?'

Jul 23, 2025

Okay, so this is something I have been thinking about for a long time, because it's something I am passionate about and something that has personally affected me - and that's the generally negative attitude that people take towards physics.
I think it's fair to say that the secondary (Middle+ High) school that I go to is one of the most elite in the country - yet I am yet to see another person with a passion for physics. There are countless who have dedicated their life to Chemistry, Computer Science, Maths, Biology... pushing boundaries and achieving genius level things in those subjects...

• TensorCalculus
• Replies: 76
• Forum: STEM Educators and Teaching

• 

 

[robphy]

Good evening, folks! I have been anticipating making a physics YouTube channel that involves teaching the subject (classical physics) , but I would like to on how to make my channel stand out and be more effective than others. Should I also provide experiments?

I admit that I am also contemplating a YouTube channel.
But, yes, I feel there are lots of things to consider before taking that first step.
(Although I wonder, if I should just dive in and figure it out while in there,
rather than planning from the outside (which could lead to endless planning).)

For your idea, including experiments might be neat... that would be different.
but at what level?
Are you looking to the get the general qualitative idea out of the experiments?
Or are you looking for more quantitative results?
For something more quantitative, do you have access to equipment?
How time-consuming would it be?
Would the experiments be your primary focus of your channel?
Or just an important supplement to other features of your channel?
For comparison, do you have specific channels that may have some similar aspects to your proposed channel?

 

[Choppy]

Success in this area is as much about identifying and catering to a target audience as it is about making cool videos. So you might want to start with what unique take can you provide, and who specifically is going to be interested in that. Videos for undergraduate physics majors will be different than those for middle schoolers. Or maybe you want to target a more general audience and give explanations for how things work.

 

[PeroK]

I'm currently an Undergraduate student at CUNY, majoring in physics (Sophomore), and a math tutor as well in my uni. I know it's not much experience, but that is my goal as I expand my career into becoming a Physics professor. I want to make Physics fun to learn for people in/outstide of STEM.

It looks to me like it's already a saturated market.

 

[sbrothy]

It looks to me like it's already a saturated market.

Which has to do with the lack of job opportunities I'm guessing (perhaps this depends on where you're from?). You'd probably need some kind of gimmick. Targeting ambitious kids or adolescents perhaps. Which I realize is probably harder than adults, but if they're motivated maybe not. I've thought about teaching simple math or programming at my local library, or even Danish (EDIT: or ,indeed, English). I know they need language teachers. This would just be for passing the time though. Not to make money.

EDIT: I can see I’m basically echoing @Choppy . Sorry.

 

[CrysPhys]

For comparison, do you have specific channels that may have some similar aspects to your proposed channel?

This is a good place for anyone planning a new offering to start. Survey what is already out there, and identify deficiencies and shortcomings to address.

 

[Choppy]

One idea that might be compelling is more of a scientific journalism slant.
Start by interviewing professors, post-docs, and graduate students on your campus. Ask them what they are currently researching, why it's important, and why they chose to pursue that particular problem. (Or anything else you want really...) You might have to decide before hand on a target demographic so your interviewees will know the rough level of an explanation your want. If you can, get video of their lab, apparatus, simulation results, etc. Do some voiceovers of any necessary background information. Then compile it all into a 3-5 minute timeslot. You could watch some three minute thesis presentations to build up an idea of what's possible to present.
There's a lot of really cool research that people are doing and I often feel it's a shame that it gets less media attention than it does.
If nothing else, you'll have a base audience of the groups of the people you're interviewing. And it will give them something to link to on their websites that will help to showcase the work they're doing, so your interviewees will be likely to promote it.

 

[DEvens]

There are already a quite few scientific journalist type YT channels.

Sabine Hossenfelder is one. She will supply your daily dose of cynicism in nearly every vid. Mostly physics, but lots of other topics.

Another is Anton Petrov. He will supply more upbeat and excited recap of scientific developments. He goes quite widely, astronomy, physics, biology, computing, and so on. His catch phrase is "Hello Wonderful Person!" and his merch has that on it.

Another is Curt Jaimungal. He interviews famous physics folk, plus some nearby subjects. And he tries to explain the topics disucssed in somewhat more detail. I still don't understand Eric Weinstein's work, even though I watched both the interview and the followup. But he has interviewed a lot of interesting folks. Penrose for example.

There are some folks who do problem solving. A guy with channel name blackpenredpen famously uses two different colored markers on a white board. His level is usually undergrad 1st or 2nd year. The channel Wrath of Math shows his work close up, his hands and paper. He also does stuff up to about 1st year. MindYourDecisions usually does math-based puzzles.

There is a channel called Cody's Lab. This guy does interesting science stuff with equipment he has at hand on his family's ranch. For example, he refined heavy water. He extracted potassium from banana peels. And there used to be a gold mine on the ranch. It played out. But there is a large container of mercury left over from the refining process, and he has done some stuff with that. For example, you can fill a toilet with mercury and it will flush, sort of.

Astrum does a lot of astronomy, but also touches on physics and other stuff. Veritasium is interesting. Kyle Hill sometimes gets up to really interesting stuff. Like he toured Chernobyl, even getting guided around by the folks who are doing remedial work on the site.

I noted three or four "women in science" channels, for example. These are women doing their degree and recording the experience in videos. There are some profs who post their lectures. The old lectures by Prof. Julius Sumner Miller are even getting posted. And at least some of the Feynman lectures are on vid and posted.

There are too many science-ish channels to watch them all. You can find these channels by searching on Google for the kind of thing you like.

To make a YT channel that gets noticed, you are going to need a niche. You need something that will stick out or make people tell their friends or post links because they find you interesting. And you will need to find it interesting yourself, since you need to post regularly and frequently to get traction from the algorithm.

The usual "wisdom" is, you can make some money at YT, but you need to put a lot of work into it. The algorithm likes regular posts, like every day.

 

[DEvens]

Now my thoughts on explaining physics for YouTube. I might be the only person in the audience for this suggestion. But it's what I like.

I want to see the theory and the experiment both. For example, Newton's first law explained as equations and such, and then demonstrated. There's a cool thing with a train set where you get a thing to fire a ping pong ball up from a moving train, and it comes back to the same spot on the moving train, showing relative motion. It was on one of the episodes of Young Sheldon.

Inclined planes, air hockey table, and various other simple equipment. And videos from your smart phone. You could do a bunch of keen experiments, combine them with the theory, and make a vid for each.

Get yourself a selfie stick and a remote button for about $20 and have a ton of fun. White board in the background with the equations. "Lab bench" in front with various simple things to demonstrate.

The hard part is then the "voice over." You want to be upbeat but not too over the top. You can add some "meat" to a vid by giving something like the history of the subject. Maybe Galileo did an experiment like it first. Or maybe it helps understand how molecules form. Or how violins work. And so on.

 

[Herman Trivilino]

Should I also provide experiments?

You should and in my opinion must include lots of demonstrations. Look for and attend as many Physics Magic Shows or the like as you can find. Make inquiries at universities and colleges to find out when these are occurring but also see if there is a professor that performs these shows at local schools and see if you can go with him. Of course there are many performers who do these on YouTube or other places.

Your biggest hurdle is that you have passive learners. Research shows that active learning is far superior. I have no idea how to involve learners in a YouTube video, other than to do and film your presentations in front of a live audience that can ask questions.

 

[Herman Trivilino]

Take a look at brilliant.org/MateoStabio

 

[MidgetDwarf]

I know someone who is very succesful in youtube/tiktok although. Not an educational channel. They bring in roughly 150k a year.

What they told me, was that todays generation has "tik tok" brain. So playing with short and long format videos. Would be something to consider.

 

[QuarkyMeson]

You’d be better off imo focusing on coursework and undergraduate research. Adding in the editing and production of a YT channel to that is a recipe for burnout.

 

[Herman Trivilino]

Adding in the editing and production of a YT channel to that is a recipe for burnout.

I was there when the technology for creating video content became available. The possibilities are enticing and the equipment (very) affordable, but I agree that the amount of effort is overwhelming. Like many others I dabbled in it but never invested the effort to bring it to fruition.

One thing I did with success was edit a bit of published content and use it in the classroom.

 

[robphy]

This is an enlightening video:
“The Future of Veritasium”