Phan

Phan is the slash ship between Phil Lester and Daniel Howell from the YouTube fandom.

2009-2010
Phil Lester created his YouTube channel in 2006, posting his first video that same year. As one of the earliest adopters of the site, Phil slowly grew to a level of popularity considered substantial for the time period. One of Phil's early viewers was Dan Howell. Dan and Phil first interacted in early 2009, when Dan contacted Phil over Twitter asking for help with his budding YouTube career, as well as trying to connect with him to become his friend. They continued to talk online, connecting on shared media interests, before eventually meeting in person and becoming friends later that same year. Phil eventually became one of the first people that Dan came out to. The two eventually moved into a small apartment together in Manchester in 2010, after they began collaborating on their respective channels and realizing that their collaboration was making more money than their individual content.

2011-2014
The pair continued to live together and collaborate until they were contacted by the BBC in 2012, where they were asked if they would be interested in hosting a radio show together for the company to connect budding online audiences to traditional media. The men were hesitant on the venture but ultimately agreed, becoming the first YouTubers to have such a job offering. The show, titled "The Dan and Phil Show," ran for two hours every week from January 2013 to August 2014 on BBC Radio 1, and operated as a request show, where fans and listeners would have the opportunity to send comments or song requests via social media to Dan and Phil directly. The two combined the traditional request show radio format with their sketch ideas from their channels, taking breaks from playing popular music requests to engage the audience in small games. This format also emphasized the idea of the radio show as both an auditory and visual medium, where fans were encouraged to watch a live feed of the pair as well as having the potential to listen to them on a radio station. The show was met with cautiously positive reviews by critics, as the idea of employing YouTubers in a position of traditional media was immensely novel at the time. However, in 2013, the pair won the Sony Golden Headphones Award for the show. During this time, the two also took the money they earned from their channels to move into an apartment together in London in order to be closer to the BBC recording studio.

On September 12, 2014, after leaving their radio show, Dan and Phil posted the first video to their new gaming channel, DanAndPhilGAMES. The two would post regularly to that channel, reintroducing a segment from their radio show known as "Dan vs Phil," where the two would compete in a video game and keep track of the winner on a makeshift leaderboard. Also in 2014, the pair began their venture of hosting the Brit Awards livestreams. Finally, the two worked with Phil's brother to found IRL Digital Ltd., created to be an independent company used to sell merch products. This venture resulted in the Dan and Phil Shop, where the two would sell joint merchandise.

2015-2018
In March 2015, Dan and Phil announced that they had co-written a book together, titled The Amazing Book Is Not On Fire (TABINOF), with an accompanying tour of a similar name, The Amazing Tour Is Not On Fire (TATINOF). Dan and Phil became among the first YouTubers to write books, as well as the first YouTubers to embark on an international tour. TABINOF became a New York Times Bestseller in months and TATINOF featured an original song that was later given a gold record disc after the two sang it for the Stand Up To Cancer charity. TATINOF ended in 2016, and became the largest-scale tour from YouTubers ever. October 2016 saw the two release a film version of the show, as well as a documentary of their journey throughout the process through YouTube Red. After that, they also released a photo book of the experience in November, titled Dan and Phil Go Outside. August 2015 also featured the pair creating the phone app "The Seven Second Challenge," which exploded in popularity at the time, although the two discontinued and deleted the app in 2019. Dan and Phil also dabbled in the realm of acting during this time, featuring in small voice acting cameos in the UK theater showing of Big Hero 6 in 2015, although their small dialogue roles were cut for the American versions and UK DVD and digital releases. In 2016, the two voiced two gorillas in an episode of Disney's child show "The Lion Guard."

In late 2017, Dan and Phil announced their second tour, titled Interactive Introverts. The show started in 2018 and was another international show, which toured to 18 different countries, making it another one of the largest tours created by YouTubers in history. They then released the film version of the show on DVD with the BBC in December of 2018. During that touring time, the two also continued to still post regularly to their gaming channel and main channels, as well as having to move to their second London apartment between tour legs, as well as creating and selling a board game called Truth Bombs in October 2017, the same month that the two announced their second tour. After the pair finished touring, they announced to their audience that they would be stepping away from their gaming channel and putting it on an indefinite hiatus.

2019-present
After their tours, books, videos, games and acting ventures, Dan and Phil fell mostly silent in 2019. Recently, the two have spoken about feeling immense burnout and exhaustion after the 2015-2018 period of their careers. However, as well as this, both were beginning to entertain the idea of coming out to their audiences. Dan released his long-form video essay on his sexuality, aptly titled "Basically I'm Gay," on June 13, 2019. The video featured a full retrospective on Dan's life up to that point and the struggles with internal and external homophobia at each pivotal moment in his personal life, as well as his career. The video explains also that a large portion of his YouTube career was spent under intense stress and guard over fear of him being outed, especially when his and Phil's fanbase grew and started shipping the two. He did take a moment to acknowledge this fact, and confirmed that the pair had been previously romantically involved, although he declined to comment on whether or not they still were, noting that both him and Phil prefer privacy in that facet of their lives. On June 30, 2019, Phil uploaded his own coming out video, titled "Coming Out To You." His video was much shorter than Dan's, and was admittedly less formal and in-depth than Dan's, according to Phil. He did not mention his and Dan's previous involvement, although both thanked the other in their video descriptions for support or help on creating their videos. From there, the two continued their hiatuses from their channels and included their other social media accounts in this hiatus as well.

In early 2020, the two began moving to a fully purchased home that they revealed they had been building and designing for years. Unfortunately, as construction and moving was underway, COVID began and the two had to put their move on hold as construction slowed as well. Around this time, Dan and Phil created a podcast-style show on the app Stereo to keep them engaged with their audience and each other during the stress of the pandemic. This small series lasted for most of 2020, before the two were able to move again, and the show ended. The two moved into the home in 2021, although construction continued until late 2021 to early 2022.

Fanon
Many of their fans ship them, secretly thinking they're together. Although many do argue that if they are hiding their relationship they are doing a lot to hide it. Fanfiction for the two ranges from them getting together, to AU's of them in different situations.

Fan art of the two is also very common. Many like to draw them as characters from other franchises like Death Note or Free!. Someone once made a fan art of Dan as Christopher Robin and he became very emotional over it. Post coming out, fan art of the two in pride gear sky rocketed, and became the dominant art in the fandom for awhile.

Video edits are also very popular. There are the one's common in most fandoms of moments between the two with music in the background, but many also like to make compilations from their videos. The compilations could be people's favorite fan moments, theories of them being a couple, or even just how many times Dan has fallen out of his chair.

On AO3, Phan is the most written ship for both people and in the Video Blogging RPF fandom. The friendship between the two is the second most written ship in the fandom.

Fandom
FAN FICTION
 * Phil/Dan tag on FanFiction.net
 * Phil/Dan tag on FanFiction.net

FORUMS
 * Phan on Urban Dictionary

TUMBLR

WIKIS

YOUTUBE
 * DanAndPhilGAMES YouTube Channel

Trivia

 * Phil and Dan are aware of the ship, and even occasionally read their fanfiction.
 * Phil and Dan both love anime.