Google launches a new app made for frugal India – YouTube Go with offline videos

Photo credit: Tech in Asia.

India is the world’s fastest growing smartphone market. But hundreds of millions in India, especially in tier-2 and tier-3 cities, have poor connectivity to the internet and they’re very frugal in their use of mobile data. At 3.3 Mbps on average, India is one of the worst performers in Asia for mobile internet speed.

So even though Indians love to stream videos on their smartphones as much as people anywhere else, it’s a luxury relatively few can afford – except in free wifi zones such as railway stations where Google has enabled it. Now, Google has taken another big step in its quest to connect with the so-called next billion. Today it launched a lighter version of its popular YouTube app in India.

See: Mobile internet is changing fast in India, but don’t let vanity metrics mislead you

YouTube Go, which is currently in beta, became available to users in India on the Google Play Store this morning. The feature that’s likely to prove most popular lets users download and save videos for offline viewing. I downloaded an Elon Musk talk which I can listen to on my next Uber ride, for starters.

There are songs, movies, and pop videos galore, but not all of them are available for downloading as of now. You get an option to either play the video or save it, but the save button is inactive in many of the videos I opened. I tried to get America’s Horse with no name, Simon & Garfunkel’s The sound of silence, and Natalie Avalon’s Summer wine; but couldn’t download any of them.

YouTube Go is also personalized by user preferences.

Other notable features are as follows:

• Control over the amount of data that will be used for streaming videos
• Sharing of videos with friends from your phone contacts
• Sharing of videos with friends nearby in offline mode without data usage
• Preview of a video to help decide if it’s worth watching or downloading
• Choice of video resolution that helps a user choose between size and quality

It’s also worth noting here that a new telecom operator Reliance Jio is disrupting mobile data plans with low-cost and free 4G in India. If data plans become affordable, the need for light apps like YouTube Go reduces. But for now, it’s a godsend for hundreds of millions of smartphone users.

This post Google launches a new app made for frugal India – YouTube Go with offline videos appeared first on Tech in Asia.

from Tech in Asia https://www.techinasia.com/youtube-go-offline-videos-for-india
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