TikTok appears to have quietly rolled out a seek bar that lets users fast-forward and rewind videos.
Before now, the platform provided no way for folks to affect video playthrough. If they wanted to watch one specific part of a video again, they had to rewatch the entire clip. Rewatching in full isn’t necessarily a significant undertaking with, say, a five- or ten-second clip, but it can get obnoxious with a 30-second or minute-long video.
The feature seems to be in the process of rolling out to all users. Those who have it will see translucent white lines appear on some videos; the line will be beneath the videos’ description, just above the Home, Discover, Post, Inbox, and Me menu bar. Touch the line, and it will offer the familiar little draggable seek dot for fast-forwarding and rewinding.
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The Verge, which first reported the new tool, notes that the seek bar seems to only be available on longer videos.
Longer videos in general are likely the reason TikTok has chosen now to add a seek bar: last week, it tripled its maximum video length to three minutes.
Tubefilter has reached out to TikTok to confirm that the feature will roll out to all users, and to see how long a video must be to get a seek bar. We’ll update this story with any new information.
