When people think about the most popular social media platforms, YouTube is frequently left out in favor of sites like Twitter and Facebook. The truth is, besides Facebook, YouTube is the most widely used online platform in the world today.
We all have browsed the site at least once to watch a music video, learn a skill, or just watch a favorite show. There is a lot you can find on this giant video-sharing platform.
However, sometimes you can run across restrictions when trying to watch a video. The good news is, you can always unblock YouTube videos from anywhere.
Apart from that, YouTube has a lot of awesome things that you may not know yet. The following tips will help you make your streaming experience even better. Below mentioned are the 9 hidden YouTube features everyone must know.
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Hidden YouTube Features
1. Creating A GIF From a YouTube Video
If you never knew, you can easily make a GIF from a YouTube video. To do so, follow these simple steps:
Type the word “GIF” right before “YouTube” in the URL of the video you are streaming. For instance, you could be watching a video of cats play fighting, which has the URL https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-N8KbQ8IM4g.
Type GIF in the URL; https://www.GIFyoutube.com/watch?v=-N8KbQ8IM4g. It will redirect to https://gifs.com/watch?v=-N8KbQ8IM4g.
- On gifs.com, you can select where you want the clip to start and end on the video.
- Click on the green tick mark on the left side to view it play.
- You can use the available editing features like cropping, inverting, blurring, and padding. You can even caption it.
- After the edits, click on Create GIF at the top right corner then add a title and tags.
- Select Next to finish and then copy the URL to share on social media.
2. The Picture-In-Picture Feature
This feature allows you to continue watching a video while using another app. Say you want to use messenger while still playing a YouTube video, Picture-in-picture reduces the video to a smaller display that you can move around the screen.
To enable this feature, go to Android settings > Apps & notifications > Advanced > Special access > Picture-in-picture, select YouTube, and flip the switch on. Note that it is only available for YouTube Premium users.
3. Playback Video At A Specific Time
When watching a YouTube video, sometimes you may come across funny bits that want to share with your friends. Say you are watching an hour video, but the bit you want to share is at 20mins and 13seconds mark.
All you have to do is add &t=20m13s at the end of the URL. An example is https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XXZFco-1zpo&t=20m13s.
4. Download Up Yo 500 Songs
YouTube recently launched the Smart download feature. It allows you to download up to 500 songs to listen to when you are not connected or you want to save data.
YouTube automatically selects the songs based on what you like to listen to. However, the feature is only available to YouTube Premium users.
5. Keyboard Shortcuts To Fast Forward or Go Back
You can skip ahead or back a YouTube video using arrow keys and letter keys. J and K will rewind and fast-forward a video 10 seconds, respectively.
The arrow keys have the same results. On your phone, you can double-tap to move forward or back and swipe left or right to go to the previous video or next.
6. YouTube TV Mode
This feature provides you with a bigger viewing screen without necessarily going full screen, and it is mainly meant for Smart TV users.
Just visit www.youtube.com/tv and sign in your account. After that, authenticate your account details with the onscreen code. The feature works best with HD videos.
7. Download Videos On Your Phone
Videos on YouTube can be saved for offline viewing. If you are a Premium user, all videos are available for download; else, free users only have a few selected videos available.
Just click on the Download and then select the quality you prefer. Saved videos are found in the library tab.
8. Use The Dark Theme
At night, the white YouTube screen is too bright. Luckily, you can always go dark, which is lenient on your eyes.
On your app, go to settings and slide the flip switch. On your computer, click on the three dots at the top right corner, choose the dark theme then enable it.
9. YouTube Video Captions
It’s not every time you watch a YouTube video that you hear every word. In that case, turn on the captions. Sometimes the video could be informative, but in a language, you don’t understand.
Here you can use the inbuilt Google translator.
Above mentioned are the 9 hidden YouTube features. We hope that from the tips above, you have learned at least something new.
