There's an iOS app for this? YouTube in the background....

April 12, 2018 3:45 PM

Obviously, you can pay YouTube for the feature of playing YouTube music in the background on an iPhone (as in Youtube is not the app currently shown on the screen or while the screen is off). But I'll watch/listen to ads instead of paying $10/month just to get YouTube Red to play in the background....

I had found a work "bug" that worked, but it stopped working when I updated -- an older version of Facebook would actually let you surf to Youtube and play any video in the background (even with the screen off). I assume there is a way to create a simple browser app that will play audio from any source (including Youtube) in the background, but has anyone done it? Or would it be against Apple's iOS developer terms?

posted by mhh5 to Computers & Internet (3 answers total)

It's against YouTube's developer terms of service to have an app that allows background playback. It can be done but they don't allow it. Apple typically don't allow such apps onto the App Store for this reason. So if you do find one, it probably won't be around for too long (YT will ask for it to removed or they'll disable the app API key, or something). I'm no longer up on the current state of iOS jailbreaking but I guess that if you can jailbreak, there's probably an app around that will allow what you're looking for (caveats of breaking iPhone warranty, potentially unknown software, etc etc).

There's a gazillion of the apps around for Android (TubeMate, iTube, etc). You'll find that most are booted off Google Play pretty quick but they survive on independent sites.
posted by giraffeneckbattle at 4:01 PM on April 12, 2018

Best answer: I use an app called Musi to do this for YouTube videos. Works just fine and is available in the US app store. It can’t cache or download videos due to YouTube’s ToS but it absolutely will continue to play in the background or with the screen off.
posted by bcwinters at 4:08 PM on April 12, 2018 [5 favorites]

Check out the Google Music Family Plan. Not sure if pricing has changed, but it was launched at $15/month for up to 6 people. If you can get 5 other people involved, it's $30/yr for ad-free access to Google Music, and YouTube Red.
posted by reeddavid at 6:46 PM on April 12, 2018 [1 favorite]