The world’s most popular online video platform, YouTube, has been on the agenda with a remarkable topic on Reddit. Some users shared that they are starting to see a new option in their video quality options, “1080p Premium”. This option, which only appeared in YouTube Premium users, naturally brought new discussions. Upon the discussions, explanations came from YouTube on the subject.
Making statements on behalf of YouTube, Paul Pennington announced that the 1080p Premium quality option is a new feature that can be tested by some Premium subscribers. According to Pennington, 1080p Premium will offer higher image quality than conventional 1080p.
1080p Premium option only available to YouTube Premium subscribers
Part of the controversy on Reddit was due to claims that users who are not YouTube Premium subscribers will no longer be able to reach 1080p quality. However, Paul Pennington flatly denied these allegations. Those who use YouTube for free will continue to use the 1080p option offered so far. The new feature in the testing phase will provide YouTube Premium subscribers with higher quality images in the same resolution.
The 1080p Premium option looks like this:
So how will YouTube offer higher image quality at the same resolution?
As you know, YouTube offers different image quality options such as 144p, 360p, 720p and 1080p. As the number increases, the number of pixels, that is, the resolution, also increases, and a higher quality image is presented. However, the quality of an image affects ‘bitrate’, not just resolution. The 1080p Premium option also reveals its difference at this point.
We can roughly define the bitrate as the amount of data used to transfer the image. The more this amount of data increases, the higher the quality of the image will be. For example, the bitrate on Blu-Ray discs with 1080p resolution can reach 40 Mbps. The bitrate of YouTube in 1080p quality is in the range of 8-10 Mbps. That’s why the quality of a 1080p video we watch on YouTube is different from a 1080p video on a DVD we buy. 1080p Premium will focus on improving image quality by offering higher bitrate at the same resolution.
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