YouTube Music podcasts are coming to the US
Are there podcasts on YouTube Music? Not yet – but YouTube has just announced that they’ll be available soon.
If you’ve ever wanted to find a podcast on YouTube without video, YouTube Music’s next move will catch your attention. YouTube Music, YouTube’s music streaming service, is moving into the podcast arena with an audio focus – whilst also enabling seamless switching between video and audio.
The announcement that podcasts are coming to YouTube Music in the US was made at The Verge’s Hot Pod Summit by Kai Chuk, Head of YouTube Podcasting. There’s no launch date yet, with the company simply stating the changes are coming in the near future, maybe as soon as March 2023.
What features will YouTube Music podcasts have when they arrive? So far YouTube has officially hinted that subscribers will be able to listen to the podcasts on YouTube Music’s free tier even with the device screen locked. By the sounds of it, you’ll also be able to start a podcast on one device and move easily to another device to finish streaming.
Podcasts will be recommended based on a user’s listening history. Audio ads will also be part of podcasts, and YouTube Channels may in the future have a podcast tab for easy switching. Google podcasts will remain a separate entity from YouTube Music podcasts.
In time, YouTube podcast creation will also arrive on YouTube Studio so Creators can set their videos as podcasts. The company also said that music rights will be the same in YouTube Music podcasts as they are in YouTube videos.
Speaking to Engadget, a YouTube spokesperson said: “We will soon start to bring both audio and video-first podcasts to YouTube Music for users in the US, making podcasts more discoverable and accessible, with more regions to come. This will help make the podcasts that users already love on YouTube, available in all the places they want to listen.”