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YouTube Moves Gaming to Main Site, Plans to Close the Gaming App

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YouTube announced a few changes to YouTube Gaming, the biggest being that the formerly separate area is joining the main YouTube site. Gaming videos can now be found at youtube.com/gaming, and the area is linked from the site's left column navigation. The area offers live gaming videos, trending videos, and on-demand clips tailored to the viewers' preferences.

The company's explanation is that it can reach more gamers through its main site than through an app, and increase creator visibility. As part of the change, it's planning to sunset the YouTube Gaming app, which it will discontinue in March 2019.

YouTube dropped plenty of stats with its announcement, noting that the site now attracts 200 million gamers daily, with the audience watching over 50 billion hours of gaming videos in the past 12 months.

The YouTube Gaming app and a separate gaming site debuted in August 2015. The area offered Game Pages for popular titles. YouTube debuted its Dark Theme in Gaming, as well as its Super Chat and Channel Membership tools.

In related news, a 27-year-old video gamer Tyler Blevins (known as Ninja online) this week became the first pro gamer on the cover of ESPN Magazine. Blevins attracts huge audiences online and makes around $1 million each month…from his Twitch account.

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