YouTube’s Picture in Picture Support Returns to iPhone Users (But Will It Last?)

Much like its parent company Google, video streaming giant YouTube has taken a very funny and scattershot approach when it comes to offering support for the latest features in Apple’s iOS and iPadOS operating systems, and nowhere has this been more apparent than the strange way in which it’s been handling Picture in Picture support.

To be clear, while Picture in Picture is a new iOS 14 feature for iPhone users, its actually just an extension of the exact same feature that’s been on the iPad since iOS 9 was released back in 2015. In all of that time, YouTube has never chosen to support the feature in its native iOS app.

While YouTube Premium subscribers could take advantage of background playback — a feature which has been available on both the iPhone and iPad since iOS 4 made its debut ten years ago — closing the YouTube app has always resulted in the disappearance of whatever video you were watching, rather than seeing it move down into a smaller Picture in Picture window like most other apps do — whether you’re a Premium subscriber or not.

Fortunately, there’s also been a handy workaround that iPad users have been able to take advantage of for years: Opening YouTube in Safari instead of the native YouTube app. Naturally, this works on the iPhone too — or at least it did until a couple of weeks ago.

iPhone Users Face Problems

Shortly after the release of iOS 14, many users found that even videos being watched in mobile Safari no longer showed up in a Picture in Picture window when switching apps or returning to the home screen. While it was easy to dismiss this as perhaps being a bug, the fact that the issue didn’t seem to impact paying YouTube Premium subscribers suggested that it was no accident, but rather a deliberate crackdown on YouTube’s part.

Shortly after the release of iOS 14, many users found that even videos being watched in mobile Safari no longer showed up in a Picture in Picture window when switching apps or returning to the home screen. While it was easy to dismiss this as perhaps being a bug, the fact that the issue didn’t seem to impact paying YouTube Premium subscribers suggested that it was no accident, but rather a deliberate crackdown on YouTube’s part.

It’s also worth noting that the problem only affected iPhone users; Picture in Picture still worked fine on the iPad, as long as you were using Safari and not the native YouTube app, of course. However, it wasn’t clear whether this was a concession to the difference between a mobile phone and a tablet or simply a result of the fact that the iPad uses the standard desktop YouTube site rather than a mobile version.

YouTube’s move didn’t seem entirely surprising, to be fair, since background playback has always been limited to YouTube Premium subscribers to prevent users from bypassing ads and using YouTube as a free music streaming service.

However, Picture in Picture doesn’t quite unlock the same listening access level as background audio playback. While you can swipe the video off the edge of the screen to continue listening, it won’t continue playing back if you actually put your iPhone to sleep, making it a fairly cumbersome alternative to paying for YouTube Premium or another streaming service.

YouTube Reverses Course

While YouTube has not in any way commented about why the change was made in the first place, we remain convinced that it was a deliberate attempt on the video streaming service’s part to control access to Picture in Picture, rather than an inadvertent accident.

After all, a mere bug should have impacted Premium and non-Premium users equally. It was very clear where YouTube had drawn the line — at the time we tested switching back and forth between two Premium and three non-Premium YouTube accounts on several of the exact same video pages, and Picture in Picture worked flawlessly when we were signed into one of the two Premium accounts, and consistently failed to work at all when not signed into those accounts.

For whatever reason, however, it looks like YouTube may have changed its mind. Last night, MacRumors discovered that Picture in Picture had once again started working just fine in the browser for all YouTube users, Premium or not.

While it originally looked like this may have come as a result of iOS 14.0.1, we’ve been able to confirm that it still works for those users who haven’t yet updated from iOS 14, and besides, it makes no sense that a limitation that was impacting only non-Premium YouTube users would have anything to do with an iOS update — iOS neither knows nor cares whether you’ve subscribed to YouTube Premium or not.

Of course, since YouTube has said nothing, either way, we also don’t even know if this is a permanent change of heart or merely an accidental regression that loosened the reins.

What About the YouTube App?

To be clear, YouTube’s Picture in Picture support still remains limited to viewing videos in Safari or other iPhone browsers such as Chrome or Firefox.

We’re still holding out hope that YouTube will finally introduce the capability into its native iOS app, and we’ve seen sporadic reports that it’s being tested right now for certain users, suggesting that the code to support it is already in the current YouTube app. It’s simply a matter of enabling it from the back-end. However, it’s anybody’s guess when — or even if — YouTube ultimately plans to throw the switch on it.

It also seems likely that YouTube is still trying to figure out whether to limit the feature to YouTube Premium subscribers. It could very well be that the restriction put in place last month was simply a matter of the company testing the waters with mobile Safari. However, if Safari continues to support Picture in Picture for all YouTube subscribers, it’s reasonable to assume the native YouTube app will follow a similar course once the feature actually arrives, which should hopefully be soon.