YouTube TV has launched a new ‘Reduce Broadcast Delay’ feature which, as the name suggests, lets subscribers reduce broadcast delays on their TV. Delays in broadcasting is not unusual with streaming, so anything that can help to reduce the delay is likely to be well received by users.
Unlike other new features, this one has to be enabled by the user before subscribers will see any change. To enable it, select the three dot ‘More’ menu within the YouTube TV app on the TV. Then select Broadcast delay and choose between Decrease for 48 hours or Default.
As explained in a support post, opting to reduce broadcast delay will result in the YouTube TV video player having less buffer to play with. Put simply, enabling the feature increases the likelihood of playback interruption and issues.
This is likely why YouTube is currently only making it possible to enable the feature for a short period of time. For example, the Decrease for 48 hours option can be enabled when planning to watch live sports in the next day or two and the app will then automatically revert back to the setting that minimizes playback interruptions once the 48 hours have come to an end.
In principle, this should ensure subscribers won’t suffer from playback stability problems at a later time and without knowing why. The downside, however, subscribers will need to continually enable the feature if they want to continually reduce broadcast delays.
In terms of device support, it currently remains unclear just how widespread this feature is right now. Google does seem to specifically mention “TV” a lot in the documentation, so some subscribers may find they don’t yet have the Broadcast Delay option available in the YouTube TV app on some of their devices.
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