YouTube is one of the most popular choice when it comes to watching videos and sharing them with others. 1 billion 300 million people watch YouTube daily with 300 hours of video uploaded to YouTube every minute! Almost 5 billion videos are watched on Youtube every single day. But out of all these people who spend a considerable amount of time on YouTube, very few of them are aware of the various features that make using the video sharing site easier.
Here are twelve YouTube features and tips you should be aware of –
1. Create GIFs
If you love a certain part of a video, you can create a GIF of it. Just add the word ‘GIF’ before YouTube in the browser tab, so that it reads gifyoutube.com.
You get redirected to a page. It is here that you can select a portion of up to 15 seconds from the video to convert into a GIF. Before you download the GIF, you also have the option of adding text and stickers.
2. Adjust the speed of videos
If you have ever had the urge to slow down a YouTube video while you are watching any tutorial, you’ll be happy to know that you can do that next time. Just go to the ‘Settings’ tab and then select ‘Speed.’ You have the option of slowing down the YouTube video by either 50% or 25% using this feature.
You can also increase the speed of videos in the same manner on YouTube.
3. Link to a specific playback point
Have you ever come across a very funny portion in a YouTube video and wanted to share that with a friend? You can save your friend the trouble of watching the entire YouTube by sharing it from exactly the point from where you want them to watch. This can be done by adding #t= to the end of the video URL.
Keep in mind that you must add the minute and the second too and ensure that the number of minutes should be followed by ‘m’ and second by ‘s.’ It would make the end of your URL look something like ‘#t=08m15s.’
4. Basic keyboard shortcuts
Most people use their mouse to pause, forward, and mute videos on YouTube. But the site has a few keyboard shortcuts that greatly simplify the video-watching experience:
k – Pause or play
j – Rewind 10 seconds
l – Fast forward 10 seconds
m – Mute
Number 0 – Jump to the beginning of the video
Numbers 1 to 9 – Navigate through 10 percent to 90 percent of the video
Spacebar – Repeat the last action
There is also a lesser-known version of the site known as Youtube.com/leanback. Leanback is an entirely keyboard-navigable website; you can scroll through videos, search for new ones, comment, share, and do everything else you do on the conventional site, all without ever having to use your mouse.
5. YouTube transcripts
YouTube automatically transcribes the audio in every video into text which can be accessed by anyone; click the ‘more’ tab and select ‘transcript’ from the drop-down menu to obtain the transcript. You can also add the transcript – either as a pre-written file or you can type it out while watching the video – while uploading the video. Doing so bolsters SEO for your video, which makes it rank higher in Google’s search index. You can also make use of this feature to transcribe audio or video files for free. The conversion of audio to text might not be perfect, but refining it is far-less time consuming than writing it from scratch.
6. The YouTube audio library
YouTube has a vast repository of free sound effects and songs which you can either download as MP3s, or use the videos you upload. The songs can be classified according to genre, mood, instrument, and duration while the sound effects can be filtered based on categories like ‘human voices’, ‘horror’, ‘science fiction’, and the like. This makes it incredibly easy to add a soundtrack to your video, which makes it more watchable than a video with no sound.
7. Sing karaoke
YouTube can be a lot of fun when used for a karaoke party. Just type the song name followed by karaoke and then search. You’ll find videos that have the entire song lyrics for you to sing along.
8. Watch videos offline
In case you didn’t know this already, you can save YouTube videos to watch them later in offline mode. Just click on the arrow below the video you are watching and you’re done.
However, note that this can only be done on mobile and not desktop.
9. Download videos effortlessly
You may not know this, but there is a very simple trick to download YouTube videos. Just type ‘ss’ after ‘www.’ in the URL of the video. You’ll be then taken to a separate page where you can download videos with ease.
10. Save videos for watching later
This one is pretty simple, and probably you are aware of it already, but we’ll include it because it truly does make life simple. If you come across a video in search results that you are interested in, but for some reason can’t watch it at that moment, you can save it for later.
11. Loop videos by a simple right click
If you right-click on a video, you actually get plenty of options to choose from. You can copy video URL, copy the URL at the current time, create a loop, troubleshoot playback issues and more.
12. Customize the ads that you see
Much like Google, YouTube also lets you control the ads that you see on the website. You can’t get rid of them, but you can definitely customize them so that you get only the content that you are interested in. Just head to Ad Preferences on Google and remove whichever type of ads you don’t want to see.
References
http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/new-features-better-youtube/
https://yourstory.com/2017/02/youtube-features-and-tricks/
https://www.rankred.com/8-youtube-tricks-might-aware/
http://www.makeuseof.com/tag/new-features-better-youtube/