YouTube Premium could be getting a new time-saving perk, showing you recommended videos directly in your playback queue rowan.davies@futurenet.com (Rowan Davies) | usagoldmines.com

• YouTube is testing a new Premium feature that shows you recommended videos in your playback queue
• The new feature could make it easier for you to add your video queue without having to use the home tab or search function
• As it stands, the feature doesn’t show you videos related to what you’re already watching

YouTube has been working hard on its tests and new additions to its YouTube Premium service, and now it’s experimenting with a new feature that could change the way you curate your video playback queue. Its latest test shows a new ‘Recommended videos’ list under your ‘Now Playing’ queue, seemingly to make it easier for you to bulk up your queue.

Found in the ‘Experimental Features’ section, a dedicated space where YouTube rolls out test features for Premium subscribers, YouTube has been experimenting with the addition of a ‘Recommended videos’ list in your playback queue, meaning you could add videos to your queue without having to leave the page. It follows the rumors of YouTube’s audio quality control feature, and Android Police has dug its claws in to get the scoop on the new experiment.

As Android Police also highlights, video queues in the YouTube app are created manually by the user and currently can’t auto-play recommended videos. According to the report, users will still have to manually add videos from the new ‘Recommended videos’ list if they want them to play in the queue. This comes with the slight inconvenience that the videos suggested to you may not be entirely related to what you’re currently playing – an eyebrow-raiser indeed.

A convenient time-saver, or an unnecessary filler feature?

As you’re probably aware, YouTube already offers video recommendations when you use the search bar function and on your home page based on your watch habits. The new feature could lift the inconvenience of having to constantly flick between your playback queue and other pages in the app to fill out a queue. However, unless it’s going to offer me content related to what I’m already watching, I’m not entirely sure where I stand with it just yet. I’ll likely give it a go regardless.

I often find myself having to use these two functions when I’m filling up a YouTube queue to build a seamless flow of videos, but crafting a queue is difficult, especially when you don’t know what to watch. This is why I like Spotify’s ‘Recommended songs’ feature at the bottom of each custom playlist, because it’s a safe function to resort to when I hit a wall with adding songs to a playlist with a certain vibe.

Music videos are my go-to content choice on YouTube. Say, for example, I’ve added a handful to my queue, and I’m stuck with what to add next. The ‘Recommended videos’ list would make my user experience all the more enjoyable if it was filled with related music videos instead of random fodder. But perhaps this is the next step for YouTube if the feature’s initial rollout is successful.

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