6 Surprising YouTube Features You Don’t Know About But Are Extremely Useful

Have you ever imagined what the internet would be like without YouTube? Well, I did, and I found that my desire to be online would be significantly reduced. YouTube is my favorite site where I spend most of my time. You can find everything on YouTube. If you want entertaining content, you’ll find millions of videos to lift your spirits. If you want to learn anything that comes to mind, there are thousands of free courses and videos available. Got a problem and don’t know what to do? You’ll definitely find a solution on YouTube. Simply put, YouTube is a treasure trove at your fingertips.

To make the most of YouTube, make sure you use all its features to enhance your experience on the site. That’s why in this article, we’ll share some of the features and tips that make YouTube stand out and improve your experience on the platform.

YouTube generates written text for all videos uploaded to the site. This means that it transcribes everything said in the video into text format, along with the timing of each sentence. This feature is very useful, especially for people who have a slow understanding of English, for example. It gives them enough time to understand the video properly. You may also need it if the content of the video is important to you and you need to have a copy of it.

To try this feature, open the YouTube site, then open the video you want to try this feature on. Click on the three dots above the subscribe button and choose “Open transcript” from the menu. A side menu will open next to the video, showing all the sentences said in the video with the respective timings. If there are multiple translations for the video, you can click on the arrow at the bottom of the menu and choose another language.

The thumbnail is the image you see before entering or clicking on the video. If you need to download the thumbnail for any video for any reason, you can do so directly without using external websites. First, copy the ID of the YouTube video, which is the last 11 characters after the (=) sign, for example:

Video Link:

Its ID: yg5cUyPBHjI

After copying the ID, place it in the following link replacing id-here:

Copy the complete link and open it in a new tab. You will find the thumbnail in the highest quality possible, and you can right-click on it and select “Save” to download the image to your device.

Simply put, you can control the ads that appear on YouTube and not just on YouTube, but on all Google services and even on websites that use Google AdSense ads. But in this case, we are only interested in YouTube, where customizing ads can be very useful, especially if you share the account with other family members. You probably don’t want inappropriate ads to be shown to them. In addition, having ads related to your interests may be beneficial in some cases.

First, open the Google account customization page here, then scroll down, and you’ll find all interests and even advertisers whose ads will be displayed on YouTube (in addition to other Google services and sites using Google ads). You can carefully review the interests and delete any interest that doesn’t suit you or you find inappropriate by clicking on it and then clicking on “Turn off,” thus you will get more relevant ads.

You may not know this, but YouTube displays the channels you’ve subscribed to and the playlists you’ve saved to anyone who visits your channel, which can be a bit annoying. You may not want to share your interests with anyone visiting your channel. Therefore, YouTube offers you the ability to keep subscriptions and playlists private. First, go to the account privacy page here, and then make sure to activate the “Keep all my playlists and subscriptions private” option.

We all hate seeing long URLs filled with letters and symbols that are hard to understand. You can customize your channel’s URL to suit you, making it youtube.com/URL. First, open the advanced account settings page, then scroll down to Custom URL, click on “Claim it here,” customize your channel’s URL, and click “Save.” However, you need to have 100 subscribers and set a profile picture and cover image for your channel to customize your URL.

If you are experiencing issues with slow video playback or buffering, where the video constantly pauses or stops, and you’re unsure whether the problem is due to the internet or YouTube itself, you can check the issue and determine the cause yourself through the “Stats for nerds” feature provided by YouTube for tech enthusiasts. Simply open the video, right-click on it, and select “Stats for nerds” from the menu. A window will appear with statistics about the video playback (which will be helpful if you’re tech-savvy). But what matters to us is the “Connection speed,” which shows your connection speed and helps you determine the reason for video buffering or slow playback by looking at your connection speed and whether it’s sufficient or not.