Google has launched YouTube Go, an app designed for mobile users living in areas with poor WiFi connectivity and data coverage that would allow them to watch YouTube videos without having to worry about incurring charges or finding a solid connection.
The app was first announced in the latter half of 2016 at Google’s Google for India event in New Delhi where the company promised that it would become available “early next year.”
YouTube Go is along the same lines of stripped back apps like Facebook Lite in that it’s been designed specifically for developing markets where the internet access is slow and unreliable.
Watch without worry
To help users save data the app gives the option of viewing videos immediately or downloading them to view offline at a later time in lower quality.
To help you decide which quality of video to download for later the app will tell you how much memory you have available on your phone and how much space a video will take up in different resolutions.
You can even share videos with other YouTube Go users via Bluetooth to encourage social use of the platform without using data.
If you can rely on regular WiFi connections or you’re on an unlimited data plan, YouTube Go probably isn’t going to be all that useful for you, particularly if you prefer high quality streams. However, if you have data charges to be wary of it could come in useful and the ability to share content offline is always useful.
At the moment, YouTube Go is only officially available to test on the Indian Google Play Store but you can also find the installer over at APK Mirror if you’d like to try it out.
- Via Android Police
