YouTube‘s latest Android version reveals that the Dark Mode feature is nearing launch. According to a teardown of the APK for the app, Dark Mode, a feature which is already available on the desktop version of YouTube and was initially revealed as coming to the Android version last Fall, seems to have had more work done to it that showcases Google is moving things along quite well and could be getting ready to push the change out to users on its mobile platform.
This takes form in a couple of different ways at this point. The first is that the video player screen seems to have a finished design when it comes to the darker themed design, which wasn’t quite finished the first time it was discovered. Now it seems that the look is pretty complete, so it could be close to getting a release as part of an upcoming update. The second is that Google seems to be working on a dark theme design that will span the entirety of the application UI and not just on the video player page. For those that actually prefer the dark theme this is likely to be a welcomed change. In addition to that it will be quite beneficial to have the dark theme when browsing through YouTube when the room is darker, as this will be easier on the eyes thank to the lack of the bright white screens. According to the details this particular part of the dark theme is further behind than the video player, so the entire release of the feature could end up being pushed out together and may be further out because of this portion of the theme.
Another upcoming feature appears to be a swipe to skip ads functionality instead of having to tap on the skip ad button, which would fit more in-line with the interaction of features for most modern material design apps. In regards to new features, there is really not a whole lot to see that is user-facing. In fact, the only thing that is visibly noticeable at this point is the new location for the autoplay settings, which is now located in its own area called autoplay from the main settings page.