The YouTube app on Android and iOS appears to have received a new video player UI with many new key elements in full-screen mode. This update appears to be a server-side update, no software updates are required to see the changes, and the biggest improvement is pretty obvious: a row of icons has been added to the bottom left corner of the player.
The icons include like and dislike buttons, as well as quick toggles to comments, save to playlist, and share buttons, while a More Videos tab on the right brings recommended content, and music videos have their own tab for listening controls.
We tested the new UI on an Android 12 device running the YouTube app version 17.03.35. Just like on YouTube’s web version, users can still choose to dislike a video, but they can only see how many likes, not how many likes.
New player controls allow for greater flexibility when viewing full-screen content, eliminating the need to minimize the video to interact with key features.