A good start to the weekend for YouTube: The Apple TV app finally gets support for 4K videos and the company restores the removed picture-in-picture feature from iOS 14.
YouTube in 4K on Apple TV
tvOS 14 is a relatively minor update to the Apple TV, but it finally makes it possible to watch YouTube in 4K. In addition to 1080p and 1440p, the option is now available to play videos in 2160p (4K), provided the video supports this of course.
According to Apple TV owners on reddit 4K support of the YouTube app is gradually being rolled out. So you may have to wait a little longer until the option also appears in your app. Users who can already get started with it, note that the YouTube app does not yet support HDR for these videos.
HDR is supported by some TVs and provides better color reproduction. It is unclear whether YouTube will add this in a future update.
Picture in Picture returns in iOS 14
In addition, there is good news for iPhone owners: YouTube now supports the picture-in-picture mode of iOS 14. Google had previously disabled this, because you actually need a paid subscription to YouTube Premium to be able to do this.
However, if you use Safari instead of the YouTube app, you can use the feature again if you have iOS 14.0.1 or later installed. It goes like this.
- Open Safari on your iPhone or iPad;
- Go to YouTube.com and find a video;
- Play this full screen;
- Swipe up on your screen to return to your home screen;
- The video will now play in picture-in-picture.
The downside is that you can’t use the YouTube app to do this and have to play it through Safari. Want to know more about iOS 14? Check out the video below in which we go through the most important innovations with you. Also check out the extensive, written iOS 14 review.