Introduction
Have you ever browsed YouTube and used that "Add to Watch Later" button?
Me too.
Are you annoyed when you want to use that button, but it is not there?
Me too!
Would you love to always have such a button, so you can instantly add videos to your Watch Later playlist?
ME TOO!
That's when I knew I had to do something about it.
And I did! The result?
YouTube Watch Later - a browser extension for Brave, Chrome, Edge, Firefox and Opera that adds a custom button to YouTube videos. One click and the video is added to your Watch Later playlist.
Why
I always work with at least two screens. One screen is for the productive stuff, the other for the rest. I work well while having a YouTube video on, and I have multiple subscriptions that I like to keep track of. Before starting my work sessions I go through my notifications, and the newly added videos I want to add to my Watch Later, because I already have plenty of videos to watch first.
Unfortunately, there is no way to add those videos to my Watch Later straight away, without opening the video first. I was doing that for a while, but it became a chore. I don't fully understand why YouTube does not offer that functionality, since there actually is a native "add to Watch Later" button – perhaps it has something to do with analytics?
Anyways, I figured I could do something about that. And yes, there probably already was a solution, but I saw it as an opportunity to dip my toes in the waters of browser extension development!
How it works
YouTube Watch Later consists of:
- A button that allows you to instantly add a video to your Watch Later playlist, either from a video thumbnail or a notification.
- A popup that allows you to configure some settings, such as the button's opacity and position.
Technical talk
When you click the button, the video is added to your Watch Later playlist using the exact same functionality as when you would click Save -> <Playlist> on the video page.
When you do this from a notification, and you have the corresponding setting enabled, the notification is marked as read – also using the same functionality as when you would click on the notification.
In order to figure out these functionalities, I had to:
- Run them in the browser using YouTube's own ways
- Inspect the network requests and webpages
- Figure out the data sent and received during the requests
I then used my findings to create the necessary requests in the extension. This way, the extension is able to add videos to your Watch Later playlist and mark notifications as read, just by utilizing the data that is already available on the YouTube page.
If you are wondering what else happens with that data, don't worry! The extension only uses it to make the necessary requests to YouTube. It does not get stored. The only data stored is the settings you configure in the popup, because it would be a bit annoying to have to reconfigure the extension every time you open your browser.
If you want to see exactly what happens under the hood, you can check out the source code on GitHub. And if you want a full technical overview of the project, click here.
Closing notes
This project was really fun to work on! I learned a lot about browser extension development and the Plasmo framework. I am happy to have a tool that makes my life a bit easier, and I wanted to share it with the world in case there are others who could benefit from it.
If you have any suggestions or feedback, feel free to reach out to me! I am always looking to improve and make my work better. For all contact options, check out the footer of this page, or the extension's website.
And if you are already using the extension, I would love to hear your thoughts! You can leave a review on any of the stores:
Thank you for reading, and I hope you enjoy using YouTube Watch Later as much as I do!