🌱YouTube Folders for Beginners: The Simplest Way to Sort Your Subscriptions

First, what is a browser extension?

A browser extension is a small program that adds a feature to your web browser (Chrome, in this case). It is not a separate app you open — it lives inside your browser and quietly adds something new to the pages you already visit. Once installed, it stays there until you remove it, and it only shows itself on the sites it is built for.

FolderTube is this kind of extension. Once installed, it adds a small button to the YouTube website itself. It does not open a new app, does not require a separate login, and does not change how any other website works — it only adds something extra to YouTube.

The problem it solves

When you subscribe to channels on YouTube, they all end up in one long list. There is no built-in way to put your cooking channels in one group and your news channels in another — YouTube shows everything mixed together, in the order new videos were uploaded. If you subscribe to more than a handful of channels, this list quickly becomes hard to scan.

A folder is simply a named group you create yourself — like "Cooking" or "News" — that you can put channels into. Once a channel is in a folder, you can look at just that folder and see only the videos from the channels inside it, instead of scrolling through everything at once.

What happens, step by step

1. Go to the FolderTube page in the Chrome Web Store and click the button to add it to Chrome. Chrome will ask you to confirm — click confirm, and after a few seconds it is installed. Nothing on your screen changes yet; the extension is just sitting in your browser now.
2. Open YouTube like you normally would (youtube.com, or click the YouTube icon if you have one). Look at the top-right corner of the page — you will see a new purple button that was not there before. That button is FolderTube.
3. Click the purple button. A sidebar panel opens on the page. This is where all the folder features live — creating folders, moving channels into them, and later, looking at videos folder by folder.
4. Inside that sidebar, find and press the sync button. This step copies the list of channels you are already subscribed to into FolderTube, so you do not have to add them one by one. It only takes a moment, and afterward you will see your channels listed inside the sidebar.
5. Create your first folder by clicking a "new folder" option in the sidebar and giving it a name — anything you like, such as "Cooking" or "Watch Later Topics." Then click and drag a channel from the list onto that folder's name. The channel is now inside the folder.
6. Go to YouTube's Subscriptions page. You will now see tabs for each folder you made — click one, and the page shows only videos from the channels you put in that folder.

A simple way to decide your first folders

Do not try to sort every channel perfectly on day one. Start with three or four broad groups that obviously fit how you already think about your channels — for example, splitting entertainment from anything educational, or splitting channels you watch daily from ones you check occasionally. You can always create more folders later, and you can move a channel to a different folder any time.

One important thing to know: each channel can only be in one folder at a time. If you put a channel in "Cooking," it is not also available under a folder called "Entertainment" unless you move it there instead. This keeps things simple — you never have to wonder which folder a channel is "really" in.

A few things beginners often wonder about

Does this cost money?

Creating folders and dragging channels into them is free, with no limit on how many folders you can make. FolderTube also offers a paid upgrade (Premium) for people who want extra features like folders inside folders, custom colors, or unlimited use of the "mark as watched" feature described below — but you do not need any of that to get organized folders working.

Is it safe to install?

FolderTube is installed through the official Chrome Web Store, the same place you would install any other browser extension. It only changes how the YouTube page looks and behaves for you — it does not post on your behalf, does not message anyone, and does not touch other websites.

What if I make a mistake?

Nothing here is permanent in a worrying way. If you put a channel in the wrong folder, drag it to a different one. If you no longer want a folder, you can delete it — this does not unsubscribe you from anything, it only removes the grouping. Your actual YouTube subscriptions are untouched by anything you do inside FolderTube.

A small extra feature worth knowing: Mark as Watched

Once your folders are set up, you may notice a button that lets you mark a video as watched. This simply makes the video's thumbnail turn gray and adds a small checkmark, so the next time you look at that folder, you can tell at a glance which videos you have already seen or already decided to skip. It does not hide or delete the video — it just makes it visually easy to tell apart from videos you have not looked at yet. On the free plan you can do this up to 30 times a month; the paid upgrade removes that limit.

What to read next

For a broader look at every way people organize YouTube subscriptions — including options beyond folders — see the complete guide to organizing YouTube subscriptions. Once you are comfortable with the basics, the guide to grouping channels by topic has more ideas for how to name and split your folders.