14 DAY TRIAL // YouTube is always on a quest to maximize time spent on the site. The more you stay the more likely you are to click on an ad, and YouTube could sure use a bump in revenue, even though it's on the right track.
So it's now introducing a new homepage, as an opt-in experiment for now, with a simplified view and a sort of YouTube "news feed" that should encourage users to stick around for longer.
"Starting today, you might notice a button on YouTube.com asking if you want to check out an experimental homepage we’ve been working on," YouTube announced.
"It’s an opt-in experiment, offering a homepage that has a real emphasis on a personalized video browsing and watching experience," it explained.
At first glance, the new homepage is hardly different. The design is fairly similar to the current homepage and only the layout is new. But, while the changes may be subtle, they are significant.
For one, everything YouTube sends your way is in one place. Friend activities - likes, uploads and so on - videos from your subscriptions and YouTube recommendations are all available in a combined list. They're still separated in groups, but you can easily scan all the content in order.
There are plenty of other tweaks as well that should make your stay on the homepage more enjoyable. All the videos from the channels you've subscribed are now listed instead of just the latest one, to make sure you don't miss any of them.
You can remove videos from the homepage by clicking on the 'x' when you hover over them. And videos you've already watched will be grayed out to make them easier to spot.
There are several other tweaks and they all have the same thing in common, they're designed to streamline the experience. The idea is to make the homepage more welcoming and make people want to come back to the site on a regular basis rather than just to watch a random video they found online or was shared with them.