We fabricate blue GaN-based vertical light-emitting diodes (LEDs) using transparent insulating SiO2 and conducting indium tin oxide (ITO) channel layers connected to the passivation layer by a combined process of electroplated deposition and a laser lift-off technique. It is shown that unlike the SiO2 layer, the ITO layer effectively serves as current spreading and injection layers. LEDs fabricated with the ITO channel layer exhibit a slightly higher reverse current when the voltage exceeds -10 V. However, LEDs fabricated with the ITO layer produce higher output power (by similar to 20% at 100 mA) compared to LEDs with the SiO2 layers.