YouTube Tweaks Android App to Hide Vertical Video Users' Shame
As sensible and not-at-all-reactionary lovers of tech, we all know that people who record videos vertically are the worst. But astoundingly, despite the opprobrium of millions of nerds, lots of people still shoot footage this way, presumably for the entirely sensible reason that that’s the way you hold your phone. Apps like Periscope and Snapchat have embraced vertical footage and now YouTube is recognizing its worth too, fixing the way it shows full-screen vertical videos in its Android app.
Instead of uselessly rotating the footage 90 degrees when you click full-screen, YouTube now actually expands the video to fill your phone or tablet’s display. As you can see with screen captures from this video, the new full-screen method (on the right) looks much better than the old way:
From left to right: a vertical video not playing in full-screen; how full-screen used to work; how it looks now.
The tweak is available in version 10.28 of the YouTube Android app (which you can find on APK Mirror if it’s not yet available for you in the Play Store), although we’re not sure when or even if the change is coming to iOS. The real question, though, is whether or not this will encourage bad habits. Vertical video would be fine in a world in which everyone only used their smartphones, but the orientation is still going to annoy people who watch YouTube and the like on horizontally-orientated laptops, monitors, and TVs. Of course, the easiest solution is just not caring at all. Good luck.
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