When you tune into a live stream, usually you get a counter that tells you how many people are tuned into the stream at the moment. However when it comes to pre-recorded videos, what you get is a counter telling you the total number of views that video has had to date, but YouTube could be changing that.
It has been spotted that YouTube is testing out a live watch counter, which means that as you watch a video, you will be able to see how many other people are watching the video at the same time as well. This could come in handy for creators who might be curious to see what’s the peak concurrent users, or if there might be a particular time that might have more users, and so on.
Alternatively given that YouTube recently rolled out an in-app messenger, perhaps the live watch counter could in the future facilitate some kind of group chat experience where users can chat together as they watch the video. This feature is already offered for live videos, so we guess offering it to pre-recorded videos might not be a stretch of the imagination.
However like we said, the feature seems to be in testing at the moment so it is unclear when it will be rolled out fully if at all, so do check back with us later for more updates.
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