YouTube Testing Ability for Users to Zoom Into Videos

[NLLV]

People claiming "safari can do this etc etc" no, not really. The native YouTube app is actually pretty good for premium features.

And people complaining about premium, people ALWAYS complain about paying for things, but I will tell you that not seeing ads completely changes the experience for many folks, and if you gave the platform a try ad free for a month, you would not want to go back.

As someone that creates video for a living, it is always a struggle when you introduce asking to get paid for your content.

I had one person state "i will NEVER pay for a youtube channel, that is insane!" (he said he would NEVER support someone on Patreon).

He admitted though that he had a cable TV package, so I guess he was FINE with paying Disney for ESPN.

The irony.

 

[NLLV]

I just checked Netflix, HBO Max, Hulu, and Amazon Prime and none of them offer this feature. Not sure why everyone here thinks this is old news when no one else is doing it.

So, no, Safari does not offer this feature either.

In general, people by nature dump on and hate Alphabet and anything they do, but they still consume more content on YouTube than practically any app (save for TikTok but that varies by age group).

It is irrational, because of the YouTube app was a BAD product, and if YouTube a BAD platform, people would simply not use it, but they overwhelmingly do.

That proves their statements of dislike are just words, virtue signaling to look tough on social media.

 

[NLLV]

YouTube’s income is hurting with just ads alone. I think charging users (forcing premium) to zoom in on videos will finally get them out of the hole. Best of luck to them…

YouTube generated a $28.8 billion dollar profit in 2021.

I am a content creator with a larger audience and over 17M views on my channel. I livestream and get superchats, have channel memberships and ad revenue on my videos (my videos get upwards of 160k views in a month in some cases).

YouTube revenue is not just from ad rolls.

Their cut of superchats and channel memberships supplements their display ads, which I think most people do not consider.

It is not unusual to watch a channel with a million subscribers have 10,000 people in a livestream, and you could sit and mentally add up the superchats that can reach THOUSANDS of dollars.

YouTube is taking 30% of those superchats, so each $1000 to that creator makes YouTube $300... multiply that out across the platform, and you quickly get a huge revenue stream that again, goes mostly unthought of by folks thinking about how YouTube makes revenue.

 

[Shanghaichica]

I didn’t even know this was a thing. It doesn’t work anyway. I’m a premium member.

 

[usagora]

Well, to be fair, no where in the post does it mention this is specifically about the YouTube app. All it says is

"YouTube is testing the ability for users to zoom into videos on iOS as part of its suite of features offered to premium subscribers."

So using the YouTube app offers a degraded and limited user experience vs Safari? 🤣 Another reason why web browser > apps

It's pretty obvious it's about the YouTube app, since YouTube develops the YouTube app, not Safari. And, no, using the YouTube app is FAR better than trying to use YouTube's website on Safari for iOS.

 

[MacDaddyPanda]

They need to worry about fixing the damn UI and banning resolutions below 1080p. And implementing a better subscription manager. Right now I have to use a 3rd party extension. Because drilling down 200 subs is annoying. Since I don't watch every sub all the time. Never have I cared about needing to zoom in on a youtube video. That sounds utterly useless to most and niche.

 

[usagora]

Yeah cool ,then let's add may to everything we want to say ,may will forgive it .

There's nothing to forgive. For example, there's a big difference in saying, "Apple may come out with a 32-inch iMac" and "Apple is coming out with a 32" iMac". The former is a perfectly legitimate guess while the latter, assuming the person making the statement does not know it for a fact, is dishonest. While it may indeed turn out to be true, the person making the statement is leading others to believe they have first-hand knowledge when they do not.

 

[usagora]

Every time I use the YouTube app I'm stunned by it's contempt for the user. You'd be hard-pressed to design a worse video player.

Care to elaborate? I use it every day without issue.

 

[techfreak23]

YouTube’s income is hurting with just ads alone. I think charging users (forcing premium) to zoom in on videos will finally get them out of the hole. Best of luck to them…

I would be willing to give them $3-5 a month just for no ads and to get rid of this damn hassle with PiP. I don't want any of their paid content for $12. I also have Spotify, so I don't need the music either. I currently use Safari with 1Blocker and I have to use a Siri Shortcut for PiP. They limit me to 720p for whatever reason, but it's better than using the app as a non-premium user.

 

[rgeneral]

Just another reason dumping the YouTube app was the best thing. Safari is the way to go!

 

[Salvor Hardin]

People claiming "safari can do this etc etc" no, not really. The native YouTube app is actually pretty good for premium features.

And people complaining about premium, people ALWAYS complain about paying for things, but I will tell you that not seeing ads completely changes the experience for many folks, and if you gave the platform a try ad free for a month, you would not want to go back.

As someone that creates video for a living, it is always a struggle when you introduce asking to get paid for your content.

I had one person state "i will NEVER pay for a youtube channel, that is insane!" (he said he would NEVER support someone on Patreon).

He admitted though that he had a cable TV package, so I guess he was FINE with paying Disney for ESPN.

The irony.

Ad-free changes the experience because Google invested big time into making the ad experience as irritating as possible by doing things like targeting users with the same ads relentlessly even if the “stop seeing this ad” option is used so they’re into primed into getting premium, I tried it for a month last year and right after it expired I was seeing more ads than even before I did the trial and I’ve found others who’ve noticed this as well.

 

[rgeneral]

I would be willing to give them $3-5 a month just for no ads and to get rid of this damn hassle with PiP. I don't want any of their paid content for $12. I also have Spotify, so I don't need the music either. I currently use Safari with 1Blocker and I have to use a Siri Shortcut for PiP. They limit me to 720p for whatever reason, but it's better than using the app as a non-premium user.

Do a search for vinegar extension on safari. It will do everything with safari

 

[HeroOfTime32]

Mine finally arrived yesterday (in the US, iPhone 13 Pro Max on the latest YouTube app release)

Same...I finally noticed it this morning! (Same phone & app version here). Been a long time coming...

 

[supernova82]

It will be good if they first fix and inprove the current features. There is still no option to search playlists. Adding videos in the playlist on mobile is buggy. There was a bug in iPad YouTube app causing to play 4k HDR videos in a very low resolution. I have encountered many other bugs.

 

[_Spinn_]

Why should this be tied to a premium subscription?

 

[tranceking26]

This didn't start working until about half an hour after I enabled it. Just like PIP it seems to have a delay.

 

[mejsric]

next feature.

You can now scroll in YouTube Premium.

 

[iPode]

Why should this be tied to a premium subscription?

Because they like adding in features for free and then taking it away only to put it behind a paywall.

 

[eperitus]

Enhance

 

[checker2010]

I’m still waiting for picture in picture in the app

i just got it yesterday in England.

 

[checker2010]

I turned it on but it didn't work so I turned it off.

i can’t get it to work on iPhone either.

 

[antiprotest]

i can’t get it to work on iPhone either.

I guess we got trolled.

 

[JosephAW]

Is there a way to make the zoom sticky though? When I pinch-to-zoom on iOS Safari during YouTube playback the video only stays zoomed while my two fingers are on the screen, which blocks some of the video content I'm trying to watch. Thanks in advance.

Also Zoom - Accessibility Shortcuts works great and you can move the zoom around with the floating controller.

 

[sideshowuniqueuser]

Every time I use the YouTube app I'm stunned by it's contempt for the user. You'd be hard-pressed to design a worse video player.

Yeah, YT is completely unusable on a phone, I almost never bother with it. On the desktop, with ad block, however, it's wonderful.

 

[sideshowuniqueuser]

I mean, it is Google.

Google are a bit two headed. Some of their products are awesome and free. Others are junk.