YouTube Music’smost recent updatehas gotten a lot of heat, mainly because of changes to the mini player that appears when you collapse the Now Playing UI. Users lost the ability to dismiss the mini player through a swipe down gesture — a popular function, as it was the only way to quickly clear the current queue aside from starting a new playlist. Thankfully, another update has provided a solution, but it isn’t as convenient as a swipe.
YouTube Music has added a newDismiss queueoption to the overflow menu that appears when you tap the vertical ellipses button on the main Now Playing screen. As reported by9to5Google, the option allows users to quickly and easily clear their playback queue without having to swipe away all the songs manually, which is what many have resorted to since the first update. This isn’t as convenient as swiping down, and it does take more effort, but it’s so much easier than swiping through an entire queue.
The popularReddit postwe mentioned in our story about the swipe down gesture getting removed has since received Reddit gold and silver, a clear indication that people are frustrated with the change. The removal of the function also doesn’t comply with the standard YouTube has set: the YouTube app on mobile as well as on touchscreen desktops allows for mini player dismissal with a downward swipe. It seems like YouTube Music will be the odd one out.
Ironically, it was the addition of new functionality that led to the swipe down gesture’s removal in the first place. Google recentlyreplaced the skip button with a cast buttonin the mini player, then added left and right swipe gestures for skipping tracks instead. To prevent accidental activation, the swipe down gesture had to go — but at least the ability to dismiss queues has been restored with this new menu item, resulting in an overall net gain in functionality.
