YouTube player has new features allowing viewers easily find interesting parts within long videos

Unlike TikTok, YouTube is commonly known for long video content. This makes it the best place for educational and even short story videos. However, spending the entire time watching the entirety of one long video through its player can be exhausting. This is relatable, especially for those who just want to look for the exact important segment of tutorial content. YouTube has a new solution for that through a variety of new features it is offering (and will be offering).

One of the most prominent features released by YouTube is a former experiment in its Premium subscription. It basically allows you to view the different parts of a video that are “most replayed” through a gray wavy graph placed behind the progress bar of the video playing. The high or tall waves of the bar indicate the parts that are frequently replayed by the viewers, while the low ones are those commonly skipped. “If the graph is high, then that part of the video has been replayed often. You can use the graph to quickly find and watch those moments,” notes YouTube.

Clicking the high parts of the bar will show you the thumbnail of the particular scene of that video, together with a time marker. It was officially launched to all users on May 18, both in its web player and mobile apps. The new feature can be useful to help users save time by easily identifying the most viewed portions of videos. It can also benefit the content creators as it will highlight the specific scenes viewers want to see the most. Moreover, it will be the best solution for video uploads that are not divided into chapters or don’t have timestamps.

Another feature that will be available in relation to skipping the parts of the videos is the support for video chapters on consoles and smart TVs. It is a segmenting tool first seen in May 2020, allowing users to watch videos by section. The feature generates the chapters, and YouTube says it is currently available to at least 20 million videos on its platform.

On the other hand, YouTube hints that it has plans to test a feature that will enable you to “seek to the exact moment in a video that you want to watch.” There are still no other details on how the company will execute this idea and plan, but one thing is for sure: it will be first available to Premium subscribers through the YouTube.com/New website. In case this feature gets a public release, it will join the current features mentioned that allow easier navigation of long videos by turning them into manageable segments.

Meanwhile, opening a YouTube video in full screen will now allow you to access different settings and functions, such as like, dislike, comment, share, or the ability to add it to your playlist. Under the full-screen mode, you will also see the different pieces of information about the video, like the comments and chapters or divisions it has.