Platforms like Snapchat and Instagram have made recording and watching vertical videos commonplace. But if you've ever played a vertical video on YouTube, two giant black bars filled most of your screen. YouTube's latest update for the iPhone changes that. On Tuesday, in a Twitter post, the venerable site for internet videos announced that the YouTube player for iOS will now automatically adapt to the shape of the video you're watching. If the video is vertical, the player will become vertical. If the video is square, the player will become square, which means goodbye, black bars.
YouTube 's latest iPhone update enables vertical videos to be viewed on iOS without black bars , the Google - owned company said on Twitter . The tweak applies to all formats of video , which can be automatically loaded to all iOS smartphones , bringing it in line with Snapchat and Facebook .