• by Colin Kirkland , August 16, 2023

YouTube Music, the video-sharing app's new music streaming service, has announced a new discovery feature that will provide users with the ability to preview excerpts, or “Samples,” from emerging songs that supposedly align with their tastes.

Similar to TikTok's feed, YouTube's Samples feature offers song snippets in a scrollable short-form video format, with each clip providing “a glimpse into the artist, the video, and the feel of the song,” per the company.

The platform, which says it has “the world's largest catalog of music videos,” stated in a recent blog post that the “personalized feed will explore the depths and breadth of the YouTube Music library so that there is always something new to listen to.”

Samples will feature both emerging artists and releases as well as “a deep cut from a legacy artist” that the algorithm determines matches up with a user's interests.

TikTok has become known as a major driver of global music discovery in the past few years, but song-centric videos are mixed in with the rest of TikTok’s video feed offerings, while Youtube Samples is attempting to differentiate itself by solely focusing on the music. 

When users discover a Sample they enjoy, they can add the song to their YouTube Music library.

From there, they are able to share the track with friends, watch the full video clip, add the track to a playlist, embark on a new in-app radio station, or use the song in their own Short.