What you need to know
- YouTube Music has been found working on a new feature for its mini-player.
- The mini-player may soon add the "Cast" icon next to the "Play" button.
- This new UI might also bring gestures to change tracks on the mini-player.
Despite being one of our favorite music streaming services, YouTube Music can often fall behind other services in implementing new features. However, some UI changes are reportedly in the works that let you cast songs from the mini-player on YouTube Music.
According to Android Police, YouTube Music is considering adding a "Cast" button to the mini-player, which will likely be placed next to the play button and ultimately replace the "Skip" button altogether. This should add another convenient option for users to cast music to their Android TV or other compatible speakers.
As for the missing skip button, it seems Google has a solution for that, too. Instead of cluttering the mini-player with more buttons, it seems YouTube Music may rely on gestures to change tracks. For instance, YouTube Music users can skip tracks after the new update by swiping left on the mini player. Swiping back to the right will return to the previous track.
Shared screenshots further reveal that the new UI changes with the newly placed Cast button and new gestures for skipping or returning to previous tracks:
While the current mini-player allows users to dismiss the player with a downward swipe, it seems this has been removed to prevent users from accidentally interrupting their music.
The latest version has yet to be made available to all app users in full. According to the Android Police, just a small number of users have the update, which suggests that YouTube may be testing the functionality or that the traditional deployment may start in the upcoming weeks.
YouTube Music has been on the verge of adding new features to its app lately. Just in the past month, the app gained a new real-time lyrics feature (which is seemingly still rolling out), a slight visual makeover to the "Library" tab, and a new dedicated Podcast listening experience.
