Google announces YouTube GO app for offline viewing and reducing data costs

Google **turned 18** today, and today also happens to be the ‘Google for India’ day where the company made a raft of India specific announcements. One of the most interesting announcements from this event has to be the launch of the YouTube GO app which is meant to be an offline-first app and focusses on minimising your data costs while you watch your favourite YouTube videos. YouTube GO will start rolling out slowly on the Google Play Store. You can sign up to be notified when it is out.  The YouTube GO app lets you preview the size of the video file, before you hit play, it lets you save these videos for offline viewing (something similar to YouTube Offline feature). But the interesting addition is the ability to share these downloaded videos with your friends and relatives without any internet access, by using Bluetooth connection. This is possible only if the person you are sharing the video with also has the YouTube GO app. The YouTube GO videos show you a preview, which is basically a gif of thumbnails from different time stamps of the video, so that you get a basic idea of what the video is about before you even start playing it.  It will also give you location specific suggestions also taking into account what other people in your location are viewing. YouTube Go homescreen features trending and popular videos in your area.