For most people, the YouTube mobile app is used for content consumption. But Google wants people to rethink what it can do.
Initially for users in India, the YouTube app for Android has been redesigned to better emphasize content creation using a 'create' button that is a giant in comparison to the other adjacent buttons. Featuring a plus sign in a circle with no label, YouTube is making the feature prominent.
To make way for this change, YouTube is moving the 'Notifications' feed to the app bar, while moving the 'Subscriptions' a bit to the right.
The YouTube team made this change to make it “easier for you to create videos on mobile.”
YouTube said that by adding this button and making it more prominent than the others, is a way to make the creation process of videos on mobile easier for the creators. There is no change in the functionality, as its just the looks and access to the button that has been made much clearer.
Functionality remains “remains exactly the same.”
Starting today, you might notice a new create icon ‘+’ in the bottom navigation bar. The Subscriptions and Notifications icons have moved, but the functionality remains exactly the same. Rolling out this week on Android. iOS to follow → https://t.co/YeBkllfVOp pic.twitter.com/S7IEUKSy3D
— YouTube India (@YouTubeIndia) September 2, 2020
In a dedicated support page, Sarah a Google employee, wrote that:
The redesign is widely rolled out in the country starting version 15.30 of the YouTube for Android app. With Google the redesign coming to "iOS and all locations globally in the future."