YouTube

YouTube begins trialing a dedicated section for upcoming live streams and premieres

Damien Wilde | Sep 15 2020 - 5:07 am PT

YouTube loves to experiment and test new features with subsections of users, and the latest will be a brand-new section for upcoming content such as live streams and premieres within the dedicated “Subscription” section.

At the moment, when one of your favorite YouTube creators wants to inform you of an upcoming live stream, it’s a bit of a frustrating experience remembering to tune in unless you have the temperamental notification bell activating for their specific channel.

This new feature being trialed by YouTube will be added to the Subscriptions feed called “Upcoming live and premieres” that will show this type of content in a completely separate section from your usual subscriptions feed. Avid YouTube viewers might find this much easier to digest, as, at present, all of this content is just thrown in one feed with videos that are less time sensitive.

[September 14 2020] Testing a new section for upcoming content in Subscriptions: We want to make it easier for you to find upcoming content (scheduled live streams and premieres) from channels you are subscribed to, so we are testing out a new section in the subscriptions feed called “Upcoming live and premieres” that shows this content separately from the latest uploads you usually see in the subs feed.
Upcoming live streams and premieres from the channels you are subscribed to will be sorted in reverse chronological order, meaning live streams and premieres happening soonest will be placed first and ones scheduled for later will follow after. You can set reminders for upcoming streams and premieres by clicking the bell to be notified when the stream or premiere goes live. We’re starting these experiments on desktop with a small group of people while we gather feedback.

While live streams are pretty self-explanatory, premieres are basically a live stream or watch-along option for uploaded content. They let you tune in to the video literally as it goes live on YouTube, making it an event like a movie premiere but with live chat functions and more.

This new YouTube live stream and premiere section will place all upcoming live content in reverse chronological order, so that anything happening soon will be more visible. Any reminders that you have set will notify you when the channel goes live or puts the premiere live. It all seems pretty obvious in hindsight, but as YouTube continues to grow and develop, these little changes help keep things organized as the platform bloats.

YouTube has confirmed that this new feature will be tested first on desktop with a small subsection of users. Feedback will be fed directly back into the system as more people use this new-look subsection. Because this UI test is completely random, you might not see the live stream and Premieres section when you load up YouTube — so don’t worry if not.