YouTube was able to announce new features for its Premium subscribers overnight. Accessible directly for Android smartphones in the United States, they should arrive on iOS later in the year. Let’s start with “Jump Ahead”, a tool that uses artificial intelligence to analyze audience data to identify the most popular segments of a video. The goal is simple: allow users to directly skip an entire video to get to this segment using a “Jump Ahead” button (the French name of the feature is not yet known).
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And since YouTube seems to do everything to accommodate users with limited attention, this is not the only new feature: the VOD service is also launching PIP (Picture in Picture) for its Shorts. To be clear, it is now possible to use this function to make the YouTube video you are watching smaller in size so that it can be played in the background while you spend your time on other applications, for example. However, this function did not support YouTube Shorts, and this is now the case on Android.
A vision of the future
In addition to the changes that are now effective on Android in the United States, YouTube was also able to reveal the projects that the development teams are currently working on for its Premium subscribers. First, YouTube wants to make Premium controls more accessible, in fewer steps. It is true that today, you have to press the “Settings” button of a video, then “More settings” and finally “Premium controls” to access them.
In addition, the video streaming giant is preparing to offer a “Smart download for Shorts” function. Premium subscribers can already take advantage of smart video downloads: this feature allows YouTube to download videos automatically based on each user’s algorithm to allow them to have access to content at any time, even if he does not have an internet connection. However, this function has so far only applied to classic videos, and Shorts are in the crosshairs for the future.
Finally, without going into further details, YouTube announced that it is working on new paid offers in more regions of the world, in order to “to introduce new plans and explore new ways for you to share your Premium benefits with your friends in the future“.
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