YouTube HTML5 Video Player Help

YouTube videos have traditionally been served up via Flash.  However, YouTube has quietly been allowing users to use a YouTube HTML5 Video Player for the last several months.  It could not be easier to get started with the new HTML5 video player.  Simply go to this link http://www.youtube.com/html5 and click the link that says “Join the HTML5 Beta” at the bottom of the page.

Join the HTML Beta

Once you click the link, your YouTube experience will change and you will now be watching video with the YouTube HTMl5 Video Player.

The first thing you will notice as your video loads up in the YouTube player is there is something new in the middle of the screen.  You should see the words HTML 5 and a new circle graphic indicating HTML 5 is loading.

YouTube HTML5 Screenshot

You will also see HTML5 written on the bottom of the video to the left of the video quality selection tool.  The YouTube HTML5 video viewer does support HD videos. All of our experiences with the YouTube HTML5 have been good.  HTML5 videos seem to load quicker than Flash videos and it would be nice to avoid the memory and crash issues related to Flash videos.

There are still some downsides to the YouTube HTML5 Video Player.  Currently, the player is only supported by the following browsers.

Firefox (WebM enabled version coming soon)

Google Chrome (h.264 supported now, WebM enabled version coming soon)

Opera (WebM enabled version coming soon)

Apple Safari (h.264, version 4+)

Microsoft Internet Explorer with Google Chrome Frame installed

There also some issues/restrictions with the current version of the YouTube HTML5 Player including…

• Videos with ads are not supported (they will play in the Flash player)
• On Firefox and Opera, only videos with WebM transcodes will play in HTML5
• Fullscreen is not supported
• If you’ve opted in to other testtube experiments, you may not get the HTML5 player

Although full screen video, is not supported now it probably will be soon.  Back in January, YouTube added fullscreen support but then quickly removed it when it wasn’t working to their expectations.  YouTube Annotations also do not work but might be added in the future.

Want to see a side by side comparison of speed loads of the YouTube Flash Video Player  and the YouTube HTML5 Video Player? Check out the video below.

Rewatchable is a Boston Video Production company.