By Nathan Olivarez-Giles 

YouTube refreshed its Android and iOS apps with a big-image look and some new smarts for picking videos you'll actually want to watch next.

When mobile users now launch YouTube -- the video streaming service from Alphabet Inc.'s Google -- the first thing they'll see is a redesigned "home" section. Promo images run nearly as wide as the phone's display, and their videos start playing automatically with a tap.

The promo images are so large, only two or three of them fit the screen, as opposed to the six or more that had been visible. YouTube is trying to compensate by making those three videos (and the others that you'll see when you scroll) more desirable. Enter machine learning. The updated YouTube app will use more of your viewing data to make suggestions you may not know about.

"The new recommendation system is based on deep neural network technology, which means it can find patterns automatically and keep learning and improving as it goes," YouTube product managers Brian Marquardt and Todd Beaupre co-wrote in a blog post.

Machine learning is often used to power voice search, facial recognition, email spam filters and apps that can automatically organize your photos based on who and what are in them. It makes sense that YouTube would use this technology to get you to stay in the app longer.

"People who have tried the new system have spent more time watching fresh videos and content from their subscriptions," YouTube's blog post said.

This move comes in the middle of a mobile video boom. Facebook Inc. is investing big in live video, Snapchat's app-only audience is growing fast, and Twitter Inc. is set to stream NFL games later this year. And the boom is expected to keep going. By 2020, 75% of the world's mobile data usage will be devoted to video, according to an estimate from Cisco, the networking-equipment maker. YouTube remains the most popular destination for video at home and on the go, and these changes are meant to help keep it that way.

Write to Nathan Olivarez-Giles at Nathan.Olivarez-giles@wsj.com

 

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

April 27, 2016 16:07 ET (20:07 GMT)

Copyright (c) 2016 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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