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Two months after entering beta, YouTube's video page redesign is ready for its close up. Google's video-sharing site first unveiled the makeover in late January, and today the streamlined interface goes live to all users.
The new look comes after a year of planning, and serves two purposes. First, it provides a cleaner UI that's "more subdued, stripped down and simple than before," according to a January blog post by Yahoo designer Julian Frumar and software engineer Igor Kofman. Second, it's designed to improve the site's stickiness by getting visitors to watch more videos and (hopefully) never leave.
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The revamped video page is structured to appeal to power users and novices alike. At first glance, the changes are subtle, but longtime YouTubers will spot the changes right off.
Additional information about the clip you're watching has been consolidated in one place--underneath the video window. To see more details about the video, you click an arrow to the right of the description snippet, or in the "views" box.
Overall look and functionality
- It’s cleaner, simpler and easier to use.
- Information about a video is now grouped together in one place and there’s a consistent way to get more detail when you need it. This way, unless something’s truly useful to you, it doesn’t clutter up your page.
- We’ve cleaned up the actions bar; you’ll see a streamlined presentation for sharing, flagging, and embedding controls.
Discovery
- The right-hand side of the page is devoted to the next video to watch. We’re smarter about suggesting the next videos to watch based on how you found the video you’re watching in the first place. – The channel name and subscribe button are now both on top of the video. We found that you prefer having a quick peek at more videos uploaders have created before deciding whether to subscribe to their channels.
Playlists
<- There’s a new playlist interface, with the next video in the list appearing consistently in the top right. You can easily expand that list or skip ahead using a new next button in the player controls.
- Saving to playlists is easier, and we’ve made Favorites the default option.
Ratings
- We’ve replaced the five-star ratings system with a simpler “likes / dislikes” model and introduced a new “Videos I Liked” list.