Searching for a video on YouTube hasn’t changed much in the past 20 years: You launch the site, bypass the algorithmic recommendations, and enter your query. I’ve found this to be a relatively reliable method for finding a video I’m looking for. In my experience, if it doesn’t pop up in a search, that usually means YouTube doesn’t have the video in question. But we’re now in 2026, which means I can only wonder: Why isn’t YouTube search powered by AI?
How YouTube’s new AI search works
Sarcasm aside, AI search is of course something Google is working on. As reported by The Verge, the company is testing a new search experience that takes a page from its “AI Mode” feature in Google Search. The idea, as the company sees it, is to make searching on YouTube feel more like a “conversation.” Rather than enter simple keywords or a video’s title, you can ask “complex questions,” which the AI will use to return results that may include both text and video. You can then ask follow-ups to “dive deeper.”
If you’re using YouTube to find a funny video, this might sound like AI overkill. But it seems the use case here is for users who might be relying on YouTube for research, or to answer specific questions. In its description of the feature, YouTube suggests asking its AI to “plan a 3-day road trip between San Francisco and Santa Barbara.” That’s the type of question Google and other companies have pitched for their AI web search tools, and I’m guessing Google sees a particular advantage with YouTube, which can tap into its enormous content library to generate answers to complex questions. That work might already happen over in AI Mode in Google Search, but this tool captures the audience that might be searching specifically on YouTube.
The Verge’s Jay Peters gave the new AI search feature a try, first by searching, “short history of the Apollo 11 moon landing.” YouTube’s AI results started with a text-based summary of the mission and walked through some highlights associated with the moon landing. The AI called out one video in particular, bringing Peters to a specific moment for information on the launch day itself. Beneath these results were a series of videos and shorts, all covering different Apollo 11 topics—pretty standard. That said, the bottom of the results, YouTube offered more prompts to try, including “Apollo 11 conspiracy theories,” suggesting the AI isn’t afraid to point users towards more fringe conversations and topics.
Peters noted that when he tried the same with a question about the new Steam Controller, YouTube’s AI made an error, suggesting that the old Steam Controller did not ship with joysticks. (It did; or, at least, one.) It’s possible the AI was pulling from an incorrect source, or happened to hallucinate the wrong answer. Either way, the example highlights that AI remains far from perfect, and while the speed and volume of these search results might suggest that the answers are reliable, you always need to double-check the AI’s work.
What do you think so far?
How to try YouTube’s new AI search
As of this writing, only YouTube Premium subscribers are eligible to test this new AI search. Assuming you have a subscription, enter a question in the YouTube search bar, then choose “Ask YouTube” before locking in your query. If you’re not satisfied with the answer, you can ask follow-up questions to continue the “conversation.”
YouTube says this feature is available to Premium users until June 8. It’s not clear whether the company will roll out the option as a full feature on that date, or will deprecate it for the time being.
