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YouTube TV Picture-in-Picture feature coming soon to iOS apps

After some miscommunication, it looks like iOS 15 devices will soon get to run YouTube TV in picture-in-picture.

Ozzie Mejia

April 11, 2022 11:05 AM

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Multitasking is critical for users on the go. Picture-in-picture is rapidly becoming a key feature for modern-day smart devices, allowing people to keep a small video window in a corner while they continue to use other phone apps. It now looks like YouTube is slowly coming around to adopting it. After an initial bout of miscommunication, the company announced on Monday that YouTube TV would soon be available for picture-in-picture on all iOS devices running iOS 15 or better.

A since-deleted Tweet (pictured above, first picked up by MacRumors) indicated that YouTube picture-in-picture would soon be available for all iOS 15 devices. YouTube has since clarified that what's coming is picture-in-picture support for YouTube TV, the company's live television service. That should be available in the days ahead.

As for the core YouTube app, picture-in-picture support for that is only available to Android users who subscribe to the Premium service. It is technically not available to iOS users, nor is there any indication that it will be any time soon. It is possible to find workarounds, such as using the Safari browser's picture-in-picture support and using that to play videos from the YouTube website.

Just to clarify – what's currently being rolled out is the YouTube TV picture-in-picture for iOS 15+ devices. If you're referring to the one for the YouTube app, it's only available to Premium members on Android mobile phones. https://t.co/wB9vUWtm3U

— TeamYouTube (@TeamYouTube) April 11, 2022

There's always room for YouTube to change its mind, so if that modern picture-in-picture feature does come to iOS in the future, we'll be sure to report on it here at Shacknews.

Ozzie Mejia

Senior Editor

Ozzie has been playing video games since picking up his first NES controller at age 5. He has been into games ever since, only briefly stepping away during his college years. But he was pulled back in after spending years in QA circles for both THQ and Activision, mostly spending time helping to push forward the Guitar Hero series at its peak. Ozzie has become a big fan of platformers, puzzle games, shooters, and RPGs, just to name a few genres, but he’s also a huge sucker for anything with a good, compelling narrative behind it. Because what are video games if you can't enjoy a good story with a fresh Cherry Coke?