Google rolls out autoplaying videos on Android
Google announced on August 18, 2017 that company engineers enabled autoplaying videos in Google Search results in Chrome and the Google application for Android. The feature will roll out to all Google app and Chrome users on Android in the coming weeks.
The company tested the change on a subset of users in previous months; it appears that the metrics have been positive enough to make the change in the Google application and the Chrome browser on Android for all users.
Starting today and rolling out more widely next week, on the Google app for Android and Chrome on Android, when video results show up in the video carousel, just like text snippets for text results, you’ll see video previews.
This means basically that videos will play automatically if they are returned when a user uses Google Search to look up information on the Internet.
The change should give users a better "idea" of what videos are about, according to Google product manager Prashant Baheti who published the announcement on the official The Keyword website.
Another reason for the change is the rise of video, and Google's continued effort to introduce video results on the company's search engine.
The new autoplay functionality plays a couple of seconds of the video automatically when it is the active element on Google Search. You may switch to other videos in the carousel, and each video that you switch to will autoplay as well.
Google displayed a single thumbnail image of video results in Google Search previously.
Baheti notes that video previews play only automatically on Wi-Fi connections and not on mobile connections. Options are available in the Settings to enable video autoplay on mobile, and to disable video autoplay when using Google Search entirely.
We have published a guide on disabling video autoplay on Chrome previously here on Ghacks.
Chrome and Google application users on Android who don't want autoplaying video results in the search results may disable the feature for now. You may use a different browser for your searches alternatively, or use a different search engine in Google Chrome instead to avoid autoplaying video results.
Now You: Do you find autoplaying video results useful in Chrome?
Thankfully I uninstalled the latest Google app on my Android and use only the old version without updates.
The only way to improve on this would be to add an auto select feature with no shut off.
As Mr. Burns says, “Eehhhxcelllent.”
An even better way to improve this would be: full auto-browsing. Let Google choose what people get to see, instead of people searching and selecting things themselves. Why leave that to the dumb consumer?
Seriously now, I’ve never met anyone, not one single person, who likes autoplay. So whatever the exact motive behind this new “feature”, it must have to do with some commercial interest – not the consumer’s interest.
And auto-select 4K resolution to ensure all of the user’s bandwidth is chewed up.
“The change should give users a better “idea” of what videos are about, according to Google product manager Prashant Baheti …. ”
Translation: All Your Bandwidth Belong To Us
The theoretical physicists at CERN/LHC should interview this guy, he’s clearly beamed in from an alternate universe.
Not an alternative universe. Just Wall street.
Like Dave said: ‘What you really mean is auto-playing “advertisements”!’. I do Not want to see auto-play video anywhere except on YouTube. And that is only after I open a specific video, not from doing a search.
I just looked and I don’t have an option for ‘Video’ or to disable Autoplay in the Google app. Running version 7.8.22 which was a recent update. I’ve had Autoplay disabled in Chrome for a long time and have DuckDuckGo set as my default search engine. Settings/Site settings/Media for Autoplay in Chrome.
Nexus 5x still running 6.0.1. Rooted, custom kernel, blah, blah. ;)
autoplay? thats bad bad bad……
i’m a unversal hater ;-) (tx dave)
What you really mean is auto-playing “advertisements”!
Auto-play is pretty much universally hated.
Autoplayng videos, YUCK.
I must wright that for not only auto play but also many outer very nifty functions the YouTube high definition Firefox add-on is very nice to have.
Especially when your like always on android have a 4k (or even on lesser/ not so much ) upload speed possibility.
This so when you startup the video the memory which is necessary for the correct uninterrupted play speed of the video, is not enough buffered for the smooth auto play function.
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/seamonkey/addon/youtube-high-definition/