It may be hard to imagine, but YouTube’s video preview images represent to many the ultimate deciding factor as to whether or not to watch a video. If a preview image looks interesting, it can mean the difference between someone pressing the play button. In addition, your site and the videos on it represent to you polished masterpieces. Yet, your videos’ preview images can appear lower in quality, and sometimes you don't want a logo in your player. So today we're rolling out new features for both situations: HD preview images and the option to remove the logo from your player.

HD preview imagesVideo resolutions have been increasing across YouTube, and the sizes of your embedded players are bigger than ever. But until now, video preview images in today’s larger players (e.g. the image that appears before you click “Play”) haven’t kept up with your high-quality and larger videos.



Any new video uploaded to the site in a resolution of 480p or higher will have an HD preview image wherever the player is embedded. The difference is even more striking with larger embeds (which don’t fit on this blog), so try it out yourself and see what we’re talking about. Here’s an example:



Before:

