New Google leak reveals a much-needed Google Photos video update

Google is testing a big update for Google Photos that could dramatically improve the video playback and browsing experience within the app.

According to recent discoveries made by Android expert Assemble Debug, Google Photos will soon receive a revamped video player with much-needed quality-of-life improvements that will make it easier to control video playback.

New features include:

• A redesigned search bar that you can feel with your fingertip as you navigate through the video
• Updated control buttons
• Double tap gestures to fast forward or rewind five seconds in the current video

Google Photos: New video navigation controls

Perhaps the biggest update is the new “dotted” search bar, the control that lets you move backwards and forwards through a video during playback. The current search bar appears as a solid line with a dot that moves along it to show your position within the video. You can tap the search bar anywhere on that line to jump to that position, or swipe left and right to scroll through the video to find the section you want.

The new version replaces that solid line with a row of dots that move from right to left as the video plays. You can slide the row of dots left or right with your fingertip to move through the video, while a subtle vibration effect helps you “feel” the movement, more like interacting with something tangible instead of just dots on a screen.

Interestingly, the new search bar doesn’t seem to indicate your current position in the video, as there is no longer a dot that moves along the line to show you.

Another new feature is the ability to skip forward and backward in five-second increments by double-tapping the left or right edge of the video while it’s playing. A similar feature already exists in the YouTube app, where double-tapping moves you ten seconds forward or backward within the video. However, the YouTube app goes further by allowing you to add additional taps to increase the jump size in ten-second increments, so tap three times to skip ahead 20 seconds, or tap five times quickly to skip 40 seconds. Whether additional taps will have a similar effect on the Google Photos video player remains to be seen.

Google Photos: New video control buttons

In the current layout of the video player, the play/pause button always appears right in the middle of the video you’re trying to watch. If you pause a video for a closer look, the play button will appear in the center of the screen, obscuring part of the video until you resume playback. The new design moves this button to the bottom of the screen, out of the way of the image.

The mute button has moved from the right of the search bar to the left. The report now refers to this as a volume button rather than a simple on/off mute control. It’s unclear at this time if the new button control now provides control over sound volume rather than just muting or enabling it. Still, your smartphone’s physical volume control already performs this function very well, so a secondary on-screen volume control would seem redundant.

However, moving the mute button to the left makes way for a new loop button: Currently, videos automatically repeat forever when played in Google Photos. Tapping the loop button will presumably disable this repeat feature, causing the video to play once and then stop.

Currently, these unreleased updates remain inactive in the version 7.4 code of the Google Photos app for Android. They are not yet available to most users, but were enabled and tested by Assemble Debug before release. This means there’s still time for Google to make changes before rolling them out to users, so the update may look slightly different when it rolls out.

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