• by Colin Kirkland , 3 hours ago

In line with AI-powered Google Search experiences, YouTube is expanding its “Ask YouTube” chatbot feature to all users in the United States, inviting consumers to utilize conversational insights on their smartphones. 

YouTube’s “Ask” feature has been available on mobile for Premium subscribers since its initial launch in April, giving users the ability to ask a chatbot complex questions and receive multimodal answers in the form of both video and text.

The AI-powered feature is designed to listen to a user’s question or request, mine billions of videos on the YouTube platform, and deliver relevant insights in the form of a conversational answer, while also allowing follow-up questions.

By tapping “Ask” on the mobile app’s search bar, a user can request the chatbot to “plan a 3-day road trip between San Francisco and Santa Barbara” and receive a selection of ideas. Suggested prompts are also provided to help users explore their search in more detail. 

While the feature first became available only to Premium users age 18 and up, Ask YouTube is now accessible to signed-in viewers 13 years or older on desktop, mobile, and on TV devices in the U.S. 

The chatbot currently works in English. However, according to YouTube’s announcement, the Google-owned company is working on bringing Ask YouTube to more global markets in additional languages.