YouTube Tests Comment Translations for Premium Subscribers

YouTube is testing out a service that will translate comments on its app for subscribers with a Premium plan. 

Comments on videos will be translated to your local language when YouTube recognizes a foreign language. The service offers you a “Translate” toggle, but you also can switch back to see the original language comment, 9to5Google notes. Premium subscribers can test the feature on both the iOS and Android YouTube apps. 

The comment translation is reportedly only being tested until September 9, so it may become more widely available after that date. 9to5Google adds that anyone who tests the feature can answer a questionnaire about their experience to provide the platform with feedback. 

You already can do a lot in the comments section on YouTube, including getting a shareable link for a comment, changing which comments show first on your video, deleting comments, and more. The ability to translate comments is a common feature on many platforms, such as Facebook and Instagram, so it’s about time YouTube made the addition. 

YouTube also on Tuesday announced translation features for captions in videos, video titles, and video descriptions. Users now will see videos in other languages that have “automatically translated captions, titles, and descriptions…” if there isn’t one in their native language.

Other new features announced this week include major changes to YouTube’s search bar. The video platform is improving its search capabilities by adding video previews, expanding global accessibility, and experimenting with search results.

With the new feature, users will get a preview of the video they’re about to watch on the YouTube mobile app, and the mobile search page also will play a snippet of the video.