All in the details: Keep your eyes peeled for these new features coming to YouTube
Oct 15, 2024 – [[read-time]] minute read
Whether you're whipping up a culinary masterpiece with a new recipe or glued to Michelle Khare's latest challenge, there’s something on YouTube for everyone.
User feedback is crucial to how we push YouTube forward. Each year, we introduce a major update that adds new features and refines the existing experience.
Expect over two dozen improvements headed to YouTube, each designed with viewers and creators in mind ... these updates are rolling out across web, mobile, TVs, and YouTube Music starting today.
This time around, expect over two dozen improvements headed to YouTube, each designed with viewers and creators in mind. These updates include highly requested features like fine-tunable playback speed, allowing for adjustments in 0.05 increments. You’ll also find improved browsing in landscape (coming later this year for our iOS users!) with greater responsiveness, and larger thumbnails and bigger text. Additionally, visual improvements across YouTube simplify the app, helping users dive into the content without missing a beat.
Starting today, these updates are rolling out across web, mobile, TVs, and YouTube Music. Here are a few others that we are excited to share:
Multitask with the improved miniplayer
We’re giving users more control at their fingertips. Browse YouTube while simultaneously watching a video with our new miniplayer, now enhanced with some modern touches.
Viewers will be able to resize and move the miniplayer in the YouTube mobile app. It’s perfect for those that love to search for more videos to add to their queues while already watching a video.
Build, share, and vote on your favorite YouTube playlists
Playlists are better when they’re built together, so we’re making it easier to create that perfect playlist with friends and family. Simply invite others to collaborate using a special link, or — coming soon to TV — use a QR code for easy additions to a playlist.
We’re also introducing new customization tools to give playlists a personal touch. Users can design their own custom thumbnails for playlists using their own photos or create new ones with generative AI.
To build a custom thumbnail, choose an image from your camera roll, and personalize it with text, filters, or stickers. To generate a thumbnail with AI, tap "Create with AI," pick a theme, and choose from the AI-powered creations.
These updates are coming across mobile, web, TVs, and YouTube Music.
And later this year, users will be able to vote on videos in playlists, letting you and your friends curate the best line-up. It also allows for further interaction with creators: a creator could use this feature to have their viewers rank their favorite unboxings or reviews.
Set your bedtime with Sleep Timer
We’ve all been there — you decide to watch a few YouTube videos before going to sleep, and all of a sudden you’re dozing off.
Here’s a solution: starting today, we are introducing Sleep Timer, which lets users set a timer to automatically pause videos after a certain duration of time. We tested this feature with our Premium members earlier this year to rave reviews. And we’re now excited to make it available to all our users on YouTube across mobile devices.
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Enjoy YouTube with your friends and family with a collaborative playlist feat. Pixel Playhouse 🤝 📺
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Upload and design your own YouTube playlist cover feat. Megha Singh 💄🪞
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Create your own YouTube playlist cover with AI feat. Xia Capretta 🌹🎨
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Use Sleep Timer to manage your experience on YouTube feat. Crystal Mae 💤 ⏲️
Gotta collect them all (YouTube edition)
What makes YouTube special is the sense of community that creators foster with their viewers. And we’ve heard from viewers that they want more ways to display their support and, of course, flex those bragging rights.
We’re bringing badges to the YouTube and YouTube Music apps on mobile devices. We’re starting with just a few at launch, with badges that celebrate unique-to-YouTube milestones, such as being one of the first set of paid members of a creator’s channel, or correctly completing quizzes. Users can even earn badges for being a top listener of their favorite artist or having a creator heart your comment.
For the collectors out there, admire your badges in the “You” tab. All this will start rolling out to users in the next several weeks!
A fresher, upgraded YouTube on your TV
This update also includes enhancements to the YouTube experience on your TV, making your favorite content shine. These subtle touches give everything a more cinematic feel, so you can settle in and get lost in the action.
The visual changes rolling out on web and mobile will also come to the YouTube app on TV. Keep an eye out for new pops of pink, as well as other light touches that add dynamism to the YouTube you know and love.
And when watching Shorts on TV, a new UI offers continued interaction with the content. Whether it's reading comments or browsing the shop, you can do it all without interrupting the viewing experience.
Last month, we shared that we’re launching immersive channel pages to YouTube on TV. When visiting a creator’s channel, a video will begin playing automatically, giving viewers a teaser of the creator’s content and taking them right into the action.
Whether it was greater control, richer personalization, or useful features, we’ve been hearing from our users that they wanted to get the most out of YouTube in a way that’s unique to them. These updates are a direct result of that valuable feedback, and they represent just the beginning of our ongoing effort to make YouTube better for everyone.
