YouTube AI Search Feature Launched! But Only These Users Will Benefit—Will It Affect Views and Engagement?
Google is now bringing generative search features to YouTube, which could significantly change how users search for videos.
This new AI-based feature is currently available only for YouTube Premium users. It includes a summary with each video that highlights the most important points. These generated summaries will appear at the top of the search results, along with video thumbnails. Tapping the thumbnail will start the video from the relevant point.
The goal is to answer users’ questions quickly—without requiring them to watch the entire video. However, this feature is optional. Premium users must enable it manually in YouTube’s experimental settings.
Who Will Benefit?
According to YouTube, the feature will eventually roll out to some non-Premium users in the US. Many Premium users are already using it to better understand key concepts in educational content, complete quizzes, and get suggestions.
Will It Affect Views and Creator Revenue?
Since important video information will be visible in the summary, users may not feel the need to watch the full video. This could impact views, comments, and subscriptions—leading to lower engagement and earnings for content creators.
A similar trend has already emerged in web search. Due to generative tools like ChatGPT and Gemini, users are asking questions directly instead of visiting websites. Studies show that traffic to news and blog websites from AI-powered search has dropped by as much as 96%.
Google Search chief Elizabeth Reid has stated that where AI overviews are shown, the quality of clicks improves, and users spend more time on the page. However, YouTube may be different. If viewers get the full summary upfront, they might skip the video entirely—affecting growth and monetization for channels.
Veo 3 Coming to Shorts
In addition, YouTube plans to bring its advanced video generation model, Veo 3, to Shorts. This model can create high-quality cinematic videos with sound and dialogue. Reports suggest it has been trained using selected parts of YouTube’s 20 billion video library.