WatchTube lets you watch YouTube videos on your Apple Watch. Not necessarily practical, but might help.
It’s hard to really want to watch YouTube videos on a screen as small as an Apple Watch, but it can be handy if you need to quickly watch something or see the next step of some guide. The WatchTube app for Apple Watch lets you do this even when your iPhone isn’t around.
WatchTube lets you watch YouTube videos on your Apple Watch.
WatchTube is free and supports most YouTube videos. However, at the time of this writing, YouTube Shortcasts and Livestreams are not supported. The app opens fairly quickly on the Apple Watch SE, and the videos you’ve chosen for you load easily with a slight delay – and since the Apple Watch has a really good screen, it looks good. However, most YouTube videos don’t have a square aspect ratio, so you’ll have to settle for black bars at the top and bottom.
Ideally, you’ll be using Bluetooth headphones or in-ear headphones like AirPods to watch videos so you don’t drain your battery too much. Otherwise, WatchTube plays sound through the speaker of the watch, which greatly affects autonomy. And the latter was not thought out and designed for reading this kind of content.
Not necessarily practical, but can help
WatchTube has four main screens: selection, search, history, and settings. You can change the selection to show only certain types of videos, such as games or news. The app also supports subtitles and you can adjust the text size, which is very handy considering the screen size.
Once a video has been featured on WatchTube, you can like it before reading. You can also use the gear icon to show more options. There you will have access to the description, activation or deactivation of subtitles, comments and even the creation of a QR code to share said video. You can use another device to scan the QR code and play the video on that second device.
Please note that at the time of writing these lines, the application does not support your account. In other words, you won’t be able to sign in to access your subscriptions and videos selected just for you.