YouTube Is Shutting Down Its Messaging Feature

YouTube is shutting down its messaging feature that allows users to directly and privately interact with one another. The announcement has been met with either exasperation or indifferent surprise depending on whether or not a user made frequent use of the feature or even knew that it existed. The YouTube team announced the shutdown this week and said that the feature will be removed on September 18th with a continued focus being placed on other social features.

The messaging feature was first introduced to the video platform two years ago and existed since then alongside other options for interacting with others such as normal comments. It's these other social features that'll be worked on in the absence of YouTube's messaging feature, a post from the YouTube team shared this week explained.

"Two years ago, we launched a feature to enable you to share videos via direct messages on YouTube," the YouTube post said. "Since then, we've also focused on public conversations with updates to comments, posts, and stories. We're constantly reevaluating our priorities and have decided to discontinue YouTube's native direct messaging feature while we focus on improving public conversations."

FYI👀

After Sept. 18, you’ll no longer be able to send or receive direct messages on YouTube as we focus our efforts on public convo tools (comments, posts, etc).

You can still share what you’re watching w/ others via the Share icon below videos.

More→ https://t.co/6vPP7fNdbU

— TeamYouTube (@TeamYouTube) August 20, 2019

With the messaging feature gone, one of the actions that'll no longer be available is the option to send a video directly to another user for them to view. YouTube's workaround for this is to instead just use the normal "Share" option found on a video's page and then share the content on another social media platform.

Users reaching out to Team YouTube on Twitter for more information have been met with a similar answer that reiterates YouTube's desire to improve other social features.

Thanks for your feedback, we’ve decided to focus on improving public conversations like comments, posts, & stories instead of focusing on direct messaging at this time. We’re always reevaluating our priorities to create a better YouTube experience for everyone in the long run.

— TeamYouTube (@TeamYouTube) August 21, 2019

YouTube's messaging feature will officially be shut down on September 18th.