YouTube plans US rollout of AI-powered Custom Feeds
The feature will let viewers shape homepage recommendations with natural-language prompts and save multiple feeds.
Google announced YouTube Custom Feeds at its Made on YouTube event, giving viewers a way to tailor homepage recommendations by describing what they want to watch. The company plans to roll out the feature soon to US users on mobile, desktop and TV; it has not specified a launch date.
The feature uses large language models to interpret requests and build a personalised feed. YouTube may suggest ways to refine a prompt, including limiting results by upload date or excluding videos with commentary.
Viewers will be able to save multiple feeds and switch between them. Their regular homepage will remain accessible, so trying a custom feed does not replace existing recommendations.
YouTube tested Custom Feeds as an experiment earlier this year. The product team also tested a feature for steering recommendations overall, but decided against shipping it after users expressed concern about disrupting their algorithm.
The announcement came alongside other generative AI updates, including improvements to Ask YouTube. The rollout described by the company is limited to the US; no availability elsewhere was announced.
