The YouTube app has received some handy features in the recent past. Late last month, Google rolled out new remote and voice commands in the casting menu of the app, making it easier for users to control playback while casting videos to a smart TV. But these aren't the only new features to make it to the app last year. Google also rolled out a new layout for the app which hid the comments section below each video and replaced it with an Up Next section. However, it doesn't seem like Google is done making changes to the comments section on the app. In the latest update, Youtube is testing a new feature that will show users a channel preview in an overlay on top of the comments section.

The feature was spotted by our Editor-in-Chief Mishaal Rahman on the latest version of the YouTube app (14.50.53). The channel previews feature appears as a pop-up message once you open the app and scroll down to the comments section on a video. The message states "New! Tap to learn more about this user!". Tapping on the profile photo of any user in the comments brings up a bottom sheet with a preview of that user's channel. As you can see in the screenshots above, the preview shows when the user joined the platform, the subscriber count, a subscribe button and the content available on the channel (comments in this case). Since the channel in this example has only posted comments, we get to see some of the most recent comments posted by (or on) the channel.

At the time of writing, the feature was only available on one of the three phones at my disposal which leads me to believe that YouTube is currently testing it with just a small share of users. We have no information on when the feature might be rolled out to all users.