YouTube Gaming to be retired

The YouTube Gaming app was launched back in 2015, aimed towards evolving the gaming community with a platform focused towards gaming content. It featured better discoverability of gaming videos and was also where YouTube tested special features like Channel Memberships, Super Chat and Dark Theme. They brought these new features to the main website & app after a while.

Now in 2018, they’re merging YouTube Gaming to the main platform. They’re calling it the new YouTube Gaming Destination, intended to be a new home for gamers.

YouTube said,

We have a strong and vibrant audience on the YouTube Gaming app, but the amount of gamers we are able to reach is far bigger on YouTube. After all, YouTube is where more than 200 million gamers come to engage with your favorite games and creators every day, watching over 50 billion hours of gaming content in the last 12 months alone. That’s why, in March 2019, we’ll retire the YouTube Gaming app and focus all of our gaming efforts on YouTube where we can reach our entire gaming community.

– From the YouTube Blog

So, the YouTube Gaming app will be discontinued by March 2019. You can find the new platform at www.youtube.com/gaming.

New Features

YouTube has introduced some major new features to this new platform. Let’s have a look at them –

Gaming Creator On The Rise – Helping New YouTube Channels

There’ll now be a new “On The Rise” section where new gaming creators will get a chance to showcase themselves so that everyone discovers their content. This feature is rolling out in the US first and will come to other countries soon. Every Sunday, new emerging gaming channels

Personalized Content

There will be a shelf for videos which is personalized accordingly to the videos you’ve been watching. This will also have new videos for your subscribed channels, followed topics, and others. A whole new section for live streams & trending videos will be present as well. Every Sunday

Verdict & Message from YouTube

YouTube Gaming has come a long way but frankly, the app has been quite useless. YouTube Gaming’s integration to the new platform will bring ease of access and the new features (especially the Gaming Creator on the Rise feature!) are significant advances for the gaming community.

From creators like elrubiusOMG who has hit live gaming records, to Ninja, the fastest growing creator in YouTube’s history who helped usher in the era of Fortnite, or itsFunneh who became one of our biggest gaming creators by making us all laugh with Minecraft and Roblox videos, we thank you for building a strong gaming community on YouTube. We’re committed to helping gaming creators succeed and look forward to seeing how you all continue to shape the future of gaming.

– A message from YouTube

What do you think about the new update to the YouTube Gaming update? Do you think people will be more willing to start a new channel after this update?