Jodi writes: After finally updating my 3rd-gen iPad to iOS 6, I went to find a clip on YouTube but couldn’t find the YouTube app on my home screen. I looked everywhere. Where did YouTube go, and how do I get it back?
Hi Jodi! Nope, your eyes aren’t playing tricks on you.
With iOS 6, the latest version of the core mobile software for the iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch, Apple tossed the old, familiar YouTube app into the rubbish bin.
Why, you ask? Chalk it up to another skirmish in the ongoing turf war between Apple and Google, who have grown to be fierce competitors in the booming smartphone market.
(Incidentally, the clash between Apple and Google was also behind Apple’s now-infamous decision to replace Google Maps on the iPhone and iPad with its own spotty, glitchy mapping service.)
So, what are we supposed to do now that the old YouTube app for iOS is gone?
One solution is to download Google’s sleek new YouTube app from the App Store. The Google YouTube app neatly replicates most of the functions of the Apple mobile YouTube app, complete with the ability to search for videos and log into your YouTube account.
You can also browse a “home feed” of recent and recommended videos, filter your video searches by date or length, and more. All in all, very nice.
You can still access YouTube from your iPad, with a little help from the Safari web browser.
The only problem with Google’s YouTube app, though, is that it hasn’t been optimized for the iPad.
Update [12/5/12]: Good news—Google just released a new version of iPad for iOS that is optimized for iPad.
Of course, you can still use the new YouTube app on your iPad, but when you launch it, it’ll look like a tiny iPhone app swimming in your jumbo iPad screen.
Now what?
Well, here’s the thing: there’s also a mobile web version of YouTube (just as there is for Google Maps), and it looks pretty slick on the iPad’s Safari web browser.
You can do pretty much everything on the YouTube mobile site that you can on the new YouTube app for iPhone, including signing in to your YouTube account, creating “playlsits” of videos, and managing your YouTube channel subscriptions.
Just type “youtube.com” into the Safari address bar on your iPad to access the YouTube mobile site.
You can add a YouTube shortcut to your iPad’s home screen by tapping the “Share” button in Safari.
You can also add a shortcut to the mobile version of YouTube to your iPad’s home screen.
Here’s how:
- First, visit “youtube.com” on the iPad’s Safari browser. (The web address will automatically switch to “m.youtube.com,” which is the official URL for the mobile web version of YouTube.)
- Tap the Safari “Share” button; it looks like a box with an arrow coming out of it, and you’ll find it sitting just to the left of the web address bar.
- A pop-up will appear with a variety of sharing options; tap the one marked “Add to Home Screen.”
- Next, you’ll get a preview of new home-screen icon, plus the chance to rename the icon if you wish.
- Everything look good? If so, tap the blue “Add” button. When you do, you’ll jump back to your iPad’s home screen, where you’ll see your new YouTube icon waiting for you.
Hope that helps, Jodi. Still have questions? Let me know!