YouTube wants to use its dominance on TV screens to sell more premium subscriptions

YouTube‘s Primetime Channels hub, which offers subscriptions to streaming services like Max and Paramount+, has struggled to gain traction. To bring more attention to its one-stop shop, YouTube is trying out a new idea: It’s going to make its TV app look more like the streaming services it’s selling.

According to The Information, a redesigned version of YouTube’s TV app will sort content into shelves, as you’d see on a service like Netflix, Hulu, or Peacock. That layout will create room to highlight Primetime Channels, which YouTube is reportedly making a priority for the coming year.

Shelves featuring category-based suggestions or curated collections of creator content will live next to a display for Primetime Channels. “People come to YouTube for everything from scripted dramas to podcasts, NFL games to the latest music—it’s all on YouTube,” reads a statement from a YouTube spokesperson. “We give users more ways to customize their experience and get all their favorite content in one place with products like Primetime Channels, NFL Sunday Ticket and YouTube Premium.”

Primetime Channels launched in 2022 as YouTube’s answer to Amazon’s Prime Video Channels, a similar hub stocked with a wide range of streaming sign-ups. Initially, YouTube looked to improve Primetime Channels’ compelling yet incomplete lineup by adding other coveted subscriptions, including some in the FAST lane

But that plan seems to have been foiled by a resilient boogeyman in the streaming space: Discoverability. A great product means nothing if users can’t find it, but if YouTube put Primetime Channels on its homepage, the mix of free and paid offerings could cause confusion.

The solution seems to be a shift in focus, with less emphasis on filling in channel gaps as YouTube tries to get Primetime Channels in front of its target audience. To make its move, YouTube is turning to one of its most dominant screens: TVs. That’s where the Google-owned hub continues to eat up more watch time each month, delivering strong returns for Google parent Alphabet. The new layout will test whether the growing community of YouTube viewers on TV are interested in using the app to consolidate their other subscriptions.

The payoff could be huge. With viewers complaining about interruptive ad experiences and the rising price of YouTube Premium, the platform’s existing revenue streams only have so much room to grow. Primetime Channels could be YouTube’s next big thing — it just needs to make sure its users know that its subscription hub exists.