What to know
- YouTube Music has introduced a bunch of changes in 2024 thus far.
- Some of these include downloading music on the web app, a redesigned share sheet, options to sort podcast episodes, and a ‘Samples’ carousel in the Home feed for Android and iOS apps.
- Upcoming YT Music features include ‘Hum to Search’ and ‘Trim Silences’.
It was an eventful first quarter of 2024 for YouTube Music users. The first three months saw Google expanding some of the YouTube Music features across platforms while updating the design elements of others. Here’s a look at all the new YouTube Music features and updates that arrived in the first quarter of 2024.
Download music for offline listening (now on Desktop)
Perhaps the most important update this year thus far, YouTube Music’s web app can now download music for offline listening. The feature has been available on YT Music’s smartphone apps for some time now but it wasn’t until late February this year that it was introduced on the web app as well. Although it’s still not rolled out fully to everyone (at the time of writing), its widescale release is underway.
YouTube Music on Android and iOS also received a redesigned share sheet. When users tap on ‘Share’, they won’t see a grid sheet that takes up more than half their screen. Instead, the new share sheet will be much smaller, displaying four to five apps, an option to ‘Copy link’, a ‘Share with other apps’ option, and a ‘Nearby Share’ option.
A new Sample carousel in the Home feed (Android and iOS)
YouTube Music also introduced a new ‘Samples’ carousel. This is an extension of the dedicated Samples tab that was introduced last year. Available in the Home feed, the Samples carousel is a collection of 10 short videos that are recommended based on your listening habits and has the ‘For You’ tag over it. Tapping on a recommended Sample video will open it in the Samples tab.
Sort Podcast episodes (Android and iOS)
After pulling the plug on Google Podcasts, the new home for Podcasts is being spruced up with important features. Now when you open the Podcast page, you’ll be able to sort episodes by “Newest to Oldest, Oldest to Newest, Most Popular, and Default”.
Apart from the aforementioned, there’s also a couple other minor updates, including a dynamic now playing indicator that moves to the tempo of the song you’re playing, and a Now Playing gradient redesign.
Upcoming YouTube Music features
YouTube Music is also set to receive the following two feature.
- Hum to Search – To allow faster search on YouTube Music, similar to what’s possible on the YouTube app.
- Trim Silence for Podcast – To skip past long stretches of silence in a podcast.
These were some of the highlights from the first quarter of 2024. Which of these YouTube Music changes do you like the best? Let us know below. Until next time!
