The official YouTube app on your iOS 8 device is great to have around when you want to watch videos. But there may be times when you want to keep listening to the songs playing from a playlist, while still checking out your Whatsapp messages or viewing the latest stories on Flipboard. When iOS 8 initially landed on iOS devices it offered the ability to listen to YouTube audio even when the app screen was not active. However, that option no longer works, so if you want to listen to YouTube songs in the background, here are a couple of options you can try out.
How to Listen to YouTube in the Background
You can play a YouTube video on your Safari browser and have it run in the background while you are using other apps. This option has a couple of drawbacks though. You can only play songs individually in the playlist and you will have to use another browser if you want to browse the web. So let’s see how this works.
1. Open up the Safari app on your iPhone or iPad device running iOS 8.
2. On the address bar of your browser, type youtube.com or just go to the YouTube website.
3. Tap the magnifying glass icon (Search icon) and search for a video that you want to listen to.
4. Tap on the video and let it play.
5. Now press the Home button to return to the Home screen and then open up another app you want to use.
6. You will notice that the song has stopped playing. Now swipe up from the bottom of the screen to open the Control Center.
7. Tap the Play button and the song will continue playing from YouTube.
You can now go ahead and use other apps while listening to Youtube songs in the background.
How to Listen to YouTube in the Background via 3rd Party Apps
You can listen to YouTube in the background by installing 3rd party apps. There are plenty of them on the App Store such as Background Play for YouTube, iMusic Video Tube for YouTube and iMusic TubePlayer just to name a few.
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