William Osman

William Osman (born June 8, 1991) is an American YouTuber and engineer based in Ventura County, California.

His eponymous YouTube channel features invention-based builds and challenges, including testing dummy fingers in car windows, building a scrap boat for a competition, and challenging other popular YouTube personalities to an egg drop competition.

Prior to YouTube, Osman used his degree in mechanical and electrical engineering to work with MRI machines, exploration vehicles, and military testing equipment.

He is also the host of the Safety Third podcast.

Osman attended Foothill Technology High School.

He created short skits with his best friend, cameraman, and assistant editor John Willner throughout high school.

During his senior year, Osman made a Stirling Engine that could turn heat into mechanical energy for the 2009 California State Science Fair.

Osman created what would become his main YouTube channel on November 25, 2013.

The majority of his early videos focused on testing his 80 watt laser cutter named "Retina Smelter 9000", in which different unconventional materials were examined for their ease of laser cutting.

Osman earned his Bachelor of Science degree from California State University, Northridge in 2014, majoring in mechanical engineering and minoring in electrical engineering.

Early in December 2017, Osman and his wife, Chelsea, lost their home in the Thomas Fire.

A GoFundMe account was started by his family friend to help pay for the damages.

Osman posted a YouTube video about the house fire on December 5, 2017, and it quickly went viral.

The GoFundMe campaign had a goal of $10,000, but surpassed $120,000 from more than 6,300 donors in 20 hours.

Osman's channel gained a lot of attention in the period immediately following the fire.

As of January 2023, Osman has posted over 160 videos and accumulated over 432 million views.

His channel hit 1 million subscribers in June 2019.

He has collaborated with Mark Rober, Simone Giertz, and many other maker YouTubers.

In August 2019, he partnered with the U.S. Navy for part of their Sailor VS series.

The Navy worked with three YouTube creators with a focus on science, technology, and math, inviting them to highlight different technical roles and equipment.

Osman was invited aboard the USS Theodore Roosevelt to compete in an egg drop competition against a pair of sailors from a cybersecurity team.

On July 19, 2019, Osman created a second channel for behind the scenes footage and snippets of his life.

His second channel now consists of videos with ranging topics: smaller quick videos, other projects he's working on, and clips of him with other fellow YouTubers.

As of October 2023, it has amassed over 461,000 subscribers.

In March 2023, Osman announced Open Sauce, a creator and maker convention inspired by Maker Faire and VidCon.

It was held at Pier 35 in the Embarcadero in San Francisco from July 15, 2023 to July 17, 2023 and featured fellow engineering YouTubers Mark Rober, Michael Reeves, CodeMiko, ElectroBOOM, Allen Pan, Jake Laser, and others.