YouTube is experimenting with better quality 1080p videos for subscribers. YouTube Premium subscribers have noticed the appearance of a new option in the settings that allow you to choose the video quality: in addition to the “1080p” item, “1080p Premium” now appears and, as the video indication suggests, the option should allow to play videos with an “improved bitrate”.
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The resolution remains the same but the general quality should be higher thanks to a less “aggressive” compression. We are not aware of specific technical details but the bitrate is the value that expresses the amount of digital information or bits transferred per second. Typically, a high bitrate allows you to define the “richness” of the information transferred, and is one of the factors that affect video and audio quality.
What it intends to do with Google remains to be seen: it could follow the strategy of offering 1080p video with improved bitrate to Premium users, hoping that the 1080p option remains available to everyone. Offering 1080p for a fee could, in fact, lead to great savings in terms of storage and bandwidth for Google.
Interestingly, the new option comes just days after the resignation of YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki. It could be the first of various initiatives for which previously there was no approval from the CEO.
YouTube has tested features in the past that it hasn’t activated. In October last year, the possibility of viewing 4K and 8K resolution videos was tested exclusively for YouTube Premium subscribers, an option which the company then gave up.
YouTube Premium is paid for a monthly fee and allows you to view videos ad-free, as well as offer the ability to download them offline in the background.
