YouTube is announcing two new updates to the platform: one minor, and one only slightly bigger. The slightly bigger of the two is the arrival of higher-quality audio. Many of us at Stuff have been clamouring for better music streaming on major streaming platforms, so we’re glad to see it finally reach YouTube. Secondly, and less excitingly, the platform is making faster playback speeds, going all the way up to 4x speed, available in more places for… some reason.
YouTube playing catch-up
Last week, Spotify finally announced lossless audio streaming, joining pretty much every other music streaming platform that already had the feature. Of the major streaming platforms, YouTube Music listeners are the only ones missing out. That hasn’t changed, but if you’re getting your YouTube Music subscription via the video platform’s paid Premium tier, then you can enjoy better audio on the video app in the meantime.
Note, we said “better audio” and not lossless or hi-res. That’s because Google has only upped the audio quality for videos on YouTube to 256kbps. If your stream and download quality settings on YouTube Music have always been on “High,” then you’ve always been listening to 256kbps audio, and this won’t present much of a difference for you, especially if listening through lightweight, uncomplicated (read: inexpensive) headphones.
On YouTube itself, this update will mostly be relevant to music videos, allowing users to match (to an extent) the audio quality to the video quality. Once widely implemented, users will be able to toggle audio quality the same way they can video.
Finally, the company is tinkering with a few other functions and features, such as playback speeds of up to 4x for mobile. For iOS, the company is also making its picture-in-picture function for Shorts, as well as Smart Downloads, available. The streaming company is also testing the “Jump Ahead” feature for desktop. If you want to sample the Premium tier, a subscription will set you back R82/m.
