YouTube is owned by Alphabet Inc., the publicly traded American holding company that also owns Google. The video platform operates as YouTube LLC, a wholly owned subsidiary of Google LLC, and has had no outside shareholders since 2006. Alphabet’s market capitalization was about $4.21 trillion on August 19, 2026.
YouTube ownership at a glance
The table below summarizes the corporate facts behind the platform, drawn from Alphabet’s SEC filings and quarterly results.
| Item | Detail |
|---|---|
| Ownership type | Wholly owned subsidiary of a public company |
| Parent company | Google LLC, held by Alphabet Inc. through XXVI Holdings Inc. |
| Largest shareholders | Alphabet owns 100%; Larry Page and Sergey Brin control Alphabet’s vote |
| Latest market cap | Alphabet at roughly $4.21 trillion (August 19, 2026) |
| Last acquisition | Google bought YouTube for $1.65 billion in stock, announced October 9, 2006 |
| Founded | February 2005 |
| Headquarters | San Bruno, California |
| CEO | Neal Mohan, since February 2023 |
Who owns YouTube today?
Alphabet owns every share of YouTube. There is no minority investor, no employee share pool tied to YouTube itself, and no separate cap table.
The chain runs three layers deep. YouTube LLC sits under Google LLC, Google LLC sits under XXVI Holdings Inc., and XXVI Holdings is a Delaware subsidiary of Alphabet Inc. Alphabet created that intermediate holding company in September 2017 to put Google and the Other Bets on equal legal footing.
Founders Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and Jawed Karim were paid in Google stock in 2006 and hold no equity in the platform now. Sequoia Capital, which put in $11.5 million across two rounds for a stake reported at roughly 30%, exited in the same deal.
Anyone buying GOOGL or GOOG owns a fraction of Alphabet, not of YouTube. The same indirect arrangement applies to Alphabet’s autonomous driving business, Waymo, though Waymo has taken outside capital and YouTube has not.
Who owns Alphabet, YouTube’s parent company?
Alphabet’s economic ownership and its voting control sit in different hands. Institutions such as Vanguard and BlackRock hold the largest economic stakes, while two people hold the votes.
Alphabet uses three share classes. Class A (GOOGL) carries one vote, Class C (GOOG) carries none, and Class B carries ten votes and is not traded publicly.
Alphabet’s April 2026 proxy statement reports that Larry Page and Sergey Brin beneficially owned about 89.4% of Class B stock as of April 6, 2026, giving them roughly 52.7% of total voting power. Page accounts for 27.4% and Brin for 25.3%.
The board elected at the June 5, 2026 annual meeting includes Page, Brin, Sundar Pichai, chair John Hennessy, John Doerr, Ram Shriram, Frances Arnold, Marty Chávez, Roger Ferguson Jr. and Robin Washington. Neal Mohan reports into Google, not to a YouTube board.
What else does Alphabet own besides YouTube?
Alphabet reports YouTube advertising as one line inside its Google Services segment, alongside Search, Android, Chrome, Google Play and hardware. Google Cloud is reported separately, and Waymo and Verily fall under Other Bets.
YouTube advertising brought in $11.06 billion in the second quarter of 2026, up 12.6% year over year, against total Alphabet revenue of $119.8 billion. The chart shows how the quarter divided across Alphabet’s reported lines.
Alphabet revenue by reported line, Q2 2026 (USD billions)
Alphabet disclosed YouTube’s combined annual figure for the first time in February 2026, reporting that advertising and subscription revenue passed $60 billion in 2025. That total exceeded Netflix’s reported $45.18 billion for the same year.
Acquisitions of this shape are common among large platforms. Microsoft bought the code-hosting service GitHub for $7.5 billion in 2018 and runs it the same way, as a subsidiary with no traded shares.
Who are the biggest investors in YouTube’s parent company?
Because YouTube has no shareholders of its own, exposure to it comes through Alphabet stock. The largest holders are index managers whose shares carry limited voting weight.
- Larry Page, 27.4% of total voting power
- Sergey Brin, 25.3% of total voting power
- The Vanguard Group, the largest institutional economic holder
- BlackRock, the second-largest institutional holder
- State Street and Fidelity, both long-standing index and fund holders
Retail and institutional investors together own most of Alphabet’s economic value through GOOGL and GOOG. Neither class can outvote the Class B block held by the founders.
Is YouTube publicly traded?
No. YouTube has no ticker, no separate financial statements and no independent valuation. Its shares stopped existing when the 2006 acquisition closed.
Alphabet trades on Nasdaq under GOOGL and GOOG, and neither Alphabet nor Google has announced any plan to spin out or list YouTube. Private AI companies without a listing, such as the search startup Perplexity, are a different case: they have shareholders, just not public ones.
FAQ
Does Google or Alphabet own YouTube?
Both, at different levels. YouTube LLC is a subsidiary of Google LLC, and Google is held by Alphabet Inc. through XXVI Holdings. Alphabet is the ultimate parent and the entity that trades publicly.
Who founded YouTube?
Chad Hurley, Steve Chen and Jawed Karim founded YouTube in February 2005. All three were former PayPal employees. They received Google stock in the 2006 acquisition and retain no ownership stake in the platform.
How much did Google pay for YouTube?
Google paid $1.65 billion in an all-stock deal announced on October 9, 2006. YouTube was about 20 months old at the time and had raised $11.5 million, mostly from Sequoia Capital.
Can you buy YouTube stock?
No. YouTube has no listed shares. Buying Alphabet stock under GOOGL or GOOG is the only way to gain exposure, and that stake covers Search, Cloud, Android and Other Bets as well.
Who runs YouTube day to day?
Neal Mohan has been CEO since February 2023, after serving as chief product officer. He reports within Google rather than to a separate YouTube board, and Sundar Pichai leads both Google and Alphabet.
