YouTube Turns 21 Today, Watch The First Ever Video

YouTube is now old enough to drink, as the first video ever uploaded to the site is 21 years old today. While founders Chad Hurley, Jawed Karim, and Steve Chen first registered the domain in February, the public beta launched on April 23, 2005, and the first video was posted. Karim posted the video to his account "jawed," showing him in front of the elephants at the San Diego Zoo. The 19-second video has amassed over 388 million views in its 21 years.

YouTube's Growth

The website grew quickly, reaching 8 million views a day by the end of 2005. By 2006, it had 100 million users, with 65,000 videos uploaded per day. YouTube's founders cashed out in 2006, selling the company to Google for $1.65 billion. Unfortunately for them, the growth never stopped for YouTube, now ranking as the second most visited website in the world. The company that started in Hurley's garage is now worth over $550 billion.

YouTube in the Archives

"Me at the zoo" is an important piece of internet history, and it's getting treated as such. In February, the Victoria and Albert Museum announced it had acquired the video to display. The museum obtained the original file for the video and used code from the Wayback Machine to display the video as it would appear in 2006, including an era-correct YouTube page. The page is on display as part of the "Design 1900-Now" gallery.

This story was originally published by Men's Journal on Apr 23, 2026, where it first appeared in the Entertainment section. Add Men's Journal as a Preferred Source by clicking here.

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This story was originally published April 23, 2026 at 6:00 AM.