YouTube introduces AI features to take on Spotify

YouTube on Friday launched YouTube Labs, its new experimental platform, introducing AI music hosts as the first feature in what is expected to be an ongoing series of artificial intelligence (AI) experiments for the video streaming giant.

This marks YouTube's latest effort to take on Spotify's popular AI DJ feature while creating a testing ground for other AI tools.

"The first experiment, AI music hosts designed to deepen your listening experience by sharing relevant stories, fan trivia, and fun commentary about your favorite music on the YouTube Music app, is now live," Aparna Pappu, vice president of YouTube Labs, said in an official blog post.


The feature appears as a sparkle icon between the thumbs up/down and comment buttons, offering users control over when they hear the AI-generated commentary.

The AI DJ Space

YouTube is late to this party, since Spotify introduced its AI DJ feature nearly two years ago. According to the company, the feature has seen engagement nearly double over the past year.

Spotify's DJ is a virtual music assistant that creates personalised music mixes for users based on their listening history and global trends, offering commentary from an AI-generated voice. This was launched for Premium users in 2023 and expanded with voice command features in 2025. Users can now interact with the DJ as well to request songs by genre, mood, or artist.

According to reports, YouTube AI hosts will provide relevant stories and insights as you listen to the radio, adding that users can snooze the commentary for an hour or a full day if they prefer uninterrupted listening.

The platform also warned that "AI commentary can contain mistakes," noting that this is still in the experimental stage.

YouTube Labs is accepting only "a limited number of US-based participants" for now, with Premium subscribers receiving priority access to test experimental features before public rollout. This follows YouTube's recent strategy of using Premium subscriptions as a testing ground for new features. Earlier this year, it had launched a slew of Premium-only features including high-quality audio for music tracks and faster playback speeds up to 4x.