YouTube has begun testing a new feature that allows users to view comments that are “timed to the exact moment you’re watching in a video.”
Google’s blog post about the update reads that the new feature is currently in testing and is only available to a small group of people on iOS and Android devices.
Commenters will be able to add their comments to a particular scene of the video, allowing other users to press the comment and instantly skip forward to that scene.
You can check if the new feature is enabled for you by going to a video’s comment section and tapping the ‘sort’ button. If it only shows ‘top comments’ and ‘newest first,’ the new feature is not enabled for you yet. If the section has ‘timed beta,’ congratulations, you’re among the few people included in the beta experiment.
SoundCloud has a similar function, displaying tiny marks on the scrobble bar to denote where commenters tied their comments to a certain section of a song or a podcast.
YouTube is currently collecting feedback from the small group of people this feature is enabled for. It’s unclear whether this feature will make it to all mobile devices or on YouTube for the web.
Source: Google
