YouTube Kids turns 2 and there’s lots to celebrate!

Since launching two years ago, YouTube Kids has grown up a lot and become a go-to destination for families around the world. With over 30 billion views in the app to date and over 8 million active viewers enjoying the app each week, it’s been exciting to see kids fall in love with the storytelling and videos from our amazing global creators. From DIY tutorials and language learning to science experiments, magic tricks and animated shows, there truly is something for every family to explore!

Our Original Content team under Susanne Daniels is adding four new Original series to YouTube Red, created especially with the YouTube Kids app in mind. These new series will feature top creators: DanTDM , Joe and Cody of TheAtlanticCraft, popular tween music act L2M, and Fruit Ninja. This marks the first time YouTube Red has invested in creators who are producing original programming for family audiences. These series will debut starting in the spring. Additional shows are in development and will premiere throughout 2017.

The first of the new original series launching starting this spring include:

• Hyperlinked: This series is inspired by a true story and stars music sensation L2M. It follows five girls as they come together to create their own website by girls for girls. They also must navigate everyday tween issues involving friends and relationships.
• DanTDM Creates A Big Scene: Catch DanTDM and his lively group of animated friends as they battle mayhem and misadventure to keep their brand new live show on the road. Each episode follows their behind-the-scenes exploits as they learn new skills, overcome challenges and find that putting on an epic show isn’t quite as easy as it looks. …
• The Kings of Atlantis: “The Kings of Atlantis” is an epic animated series that follows two young monarchs —Cody and Joe— in the vast underwater city of Atlantis as they seek to overthrow the brutal usurper of their kingdom, reclaim their birthright, and protect their people from his cruel reign.
• Fruit Ninja: Frenzy Force: Four Fruit Ninjas set up a juice stand as a front for the messiest secret service in the world. The new Fruit Ninja characters—Seb, Niya, Peng and Ralph—come together to fight the evil forces of Durian Grey and the Deep Fried Samurai. They will use their Juice Jitsu skills (and perhaps some help from their own samurai) to prevail.

But the fun doesn’t stop there ... YouTube Kids is coming soon to Smart TVs. Parents and kids often enjoy watching their favorite family programming on a big screen, so it's a natural next step for the app to be available directly from the big screen in your home! The YouTube Kids app will be available soon for download on a number of internet-connected LG and Samsung Smart TVs.

As kids continue to grow up, we’re excited to grow up with them. It’s important that kids are able to explore what they love in the app, while we also continue to put parents in the driver’s seat to choose what is right for their family.

From engaging new shows to being able to watch in your living room, our 2nd birthday is shaping up to be a memorable one. We’re looking forward to all the other new things 2017 will bring. From our screen to yours. ...

Malik Ducard, YouTube’s Global Head of Family and Learning, recently watched “A Pep Talk from Kid President.”