I’d like to talk about a useful app for Android known as “YouTube Vanced” or just Vanced for short. It’s highly recommended for anyone that uses Android on their device and is a heavy YouTube watcher.
YouTube Vanced and its features
Vanced looks very similar to the official YouTube app because it’s basically a modified version of it. It includes handy features such as black/dark themes, background playback ability, ad blocking, and more in the settings.
One feature that I have grown to appreciate is most definitely the ad blocking. I can put Vanced on a tablet for my daughter and when it’s time for a little video, she can enjoy watching some of her favorite shows without an ad interrupting her viewing experience.
You don’t have to be an expert or have a rooted phone to install it, either. All you need to do is download the APK (installer file) and side load it on your device. It won’t come from the Google Play store, so you’re basically installing this yourself, just like on a regular computer.
Each phone/device will vary a bit, but you just need to enable sideloading of apps. Some sort of warning will probably pop up when you go to install it saying something to the effect of “Are you sure you want to install apps from unknown sources?” which you need to tap yes.
Of course, installing strange apps not in the Google Play Store is not recommended, but if you do enough research, you should be able to determine which projects are safe to install. In this case, I can say that YouTube Vanced is safe to install as long as you get it from the direct source.
The official site is known as “vanced.app” which I have included a link to at the bottom of this article. It can also be found on XDA, a well known site for Android developers. If that result comes up when you do a search, then that can be considered trustworthy as well.
As far as I know, there is nothing like Vanced for iOS, so it’s an Android-only party at the moment. If I happen to come across something similar for iOS I will be sure to cover it.
Final Thoughts
YouTube Vanced is an essential app for anyone that enjoys watching YouTube on their device. I personally don’t watch a lot of YouTube on my mobile phone, but in the rare case that I do, I rely on Vanced for that.
Link: Download it!
Download it now