New ‘YouTube Gaming’ Launched, Goes Head-To-Head Against Twitch

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YouTube has just launched YouTube Gaming on the web, iOS and Android, going head-to-head against Twitch, a leading video platform and community for gamers owned by Amazon. As reported by TechCrunch, the the mobile app for YouTube Gaming offers a similar interface as the web, with a search bar at the top, a few featured channels and a feed of the most popular channels. The app also features to other tabs, a “Games” tab and a “Channels” tab.

When you browse by game, you can see the trending games and popular games — the latter selection is one of Twitch’s most popular feature as Twitch’s homepage features a grid of the most popular games right now. It’s a great way to know if there is a big event or competition happening for a particular game. You can favorite games and add them to your games at the top of this list. 

In the last tab, you can find a list of featured channels divided in two. The first half features current live channels ordered by number of subscribers, while the second half features a list of offline channels ordered by subscribers as well.

It is interesting to note that many popular traditional YouTube channels are now YouTube Gaming channels as well. Since YouTube is already a popular video site for gaming videos, many YouTubers can now seamlessly become popular live streamers and take advantage of their existing audience.

Of course it all comes down to the content in the end. As the source mentions it, if YouTube can convince Riot to stream its League of Legends competitions on YouTube Gaming instead of Twitch, it could make millions of people tune in YouTube Gaming overnight.

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