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Hands-on with the latest bottom bar A/B test of YouTube for Android [Gallery]

From minor tweaks to entire redesigns, Google is notorious for A/B testing a number of different versions of its YouTube app at the same time. The latest has the Android client adopt a bottom bar in line with many of Google’s other Material apps…


Like Google Photos and Play Newsstand, YouTube now uses black icons with text labels underneath on a white background. In fact, there are very few hints of red with both the action and navigation bar switching to the lighter color scheme. The only hint of color I noticed, so far, was a circular notification when there are new videos to watch in the Subscriptions tab.

This redesign gets rid of the dedicated FAB used to upload videos and moves it to the action bar. To its right is a search icon, as well as your new profile page. Interestingly, that page slides up as a separate panel from the bottom of the screen.

The Home, Trending, Subscriptions, and Shared sections remain completely identical to the existing app, but there is a new Library tab that features quick links to history, watch later, and all your playlists. Unlike with tabs, you can no longer swipe between the different sections of the app.

Picture-in-Picture remains the same, as does scrolling through the various feeds of videos. It looks slightly weird how the PiP rests just above the bottom bar.

It’s not clear when this design will rollout to all users.

 

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Avatar for Abner Li Abner Li

Editor-in-chief. Interested in the minutiae of Google and Alphabet. Tips/talk: abner@9to5g.com

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