YouTube Music is getting a Spotify-style feature on Nest speakers

One of the most convenient features of Spotify is Spotify Connect. With Spotify Connect, you can control music on any connected Spotify-enabled device through your smartphone, without the hassle of Bluetooth pairing. It makes it rather convenient when transitioning from one playback device to another. Google’s own music app, YouTube Music, is now finally getting the same feature on Google Cast-enabled devices like the Nest Audio.

As spotted by Redditor jmd494 (via AndroidPolice), initiating YouTube Music playback on a Google Assistant-enabled smart speaker and then opening up the YouTube Music app on your phone will automatically create a Google Cast connection between the two.

It takes the app about a second to recognize that something is playing on a connected device, but once it does so, you can begin controlling playback through your phone.

This is neat as it is rather seamless, as if you had begun a Cast session from within YouTube Music on your phone itself. You can control the speaker’s volume, check out upcoming tracks in the playlist, and even make use of the media controls in Android’s Quick Settings panel to control playback on your speaker.

There is potential for some friction with this feature. If you would like to retain playback functions independently on both your smart speaker and your phone, that will not be possible if you are on the same Wi-Fi and using the same YouTube Music account on both. The speaker’s playlist will override your phone’s queue and you will be forced to take over control on the phone.

The report mentions that the change is server-side, so you can expect it to roll out gradually to all YouTube Music accounts. It would help if you are on the latest version of the app. It’s great to see YouTube Music catching up to Spotify as it gives consumers competitive choices.