To mark 12 years since its launch, Google’s online video portal YouTube is undergoing a redesign – with a brand new logo – and adding a raft of new features. The updates will start rolling out effective immediately, with an onus to keep the YouTube brand legible across both desktop and mobile.
In a blog post, Neal Mohan, Chief Product Officer at YouTube, outlined the reasons for the redesign and what users can expect in the future: “When YouTube launched 12 years ago, it was a single website that supported one video format, 320×240 at 4:3 aspect ratio. Fast forward to today, and YouTube lets you watch any combination of SD, HD, 4K, 360, 3-D, and live video on nearly every device with an internet connection – from desktops to phones, tablets to TVs, game consoles, and even VR headsets. We’ve also introduced apps and services that give you new ways to watch and get even closer to the content and creators you love. Music fans, gamers, and TV lovers each have unique experiences specifically tailored for their favourite content with YouTube Music, YouTube Gaming and YouTube TV. For families looking for the best way to watch together, we launched the YouTube Kids app. And for fans who want an uninterrupted, ad-free experience, and exclusive original content from creators, there’s the YouTube Red membership. To put it simply, YouTube’s evolved … a lot. And we’re not even close to done. Over the last few months we’ve started releasing updates and will continue to throughout the rest of the year. When all is said and done, we’ll bring a new level of functionality and a more consistent look across our desktop and mobile experiences. Let’s start with the YouTube mobile app, which is getting a bunch of new features:
Looking beyond the YouTube app, we’ve also been working on a new desktop design. And thanks to all the positive feedback, we’re now excited to make it available to all our users around the globe starting today! Our new look applies Material Design to YouTube and delivers a fresh, simple and intuitive user experience that lets content shine – because there’s nothing more important than the creators and videos we all love to watch. My favourite feature of this new desktop design is Dark Theme, which turns the background dark while you watch for a more cinematic look.
The bright red cherry on top of this update sundae is a refreshed YouTube Logo and YouTube Icon. Designed for our multi-screen world, the updated Logo combines a cleaned up version of the YouTube wordmark and Icon, creating a more flexible design that works better across a variety of devices, even on the tiniest screens. Why’s it more flexible? When room is limited (say on a smartphone) you can use the brightened up Icon as an abbreviated Logo, which will be seen more easily and read more clearly. You’ll see the new Logo and Icon roll out across mobile and desktop today, and across all our other apps and services soon.
We know this is a lot of change, but we want to make clear that there’s one thing that stays the same: YouTube’s mission. We’re here to give people a voice and show them the world – no matter what device they use.”
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