on Thursday announced that its Video Editor and Photo slideshows tools are being retired on September 20. Not all editing features are being removed however - creators will still be able to use the Enhancements like trimming, blurring, and filters. The company cites limited usage of the two features as the reason for the discontinuation.
Making the announcement on a Google Product Forum page, Marissa, a community manager, said, "We've seen limited usage of these features, so we're retiring them to focus our efforts on building new tools and improving on other existing features."
Those YouTube creators that still have projects in the Video Editor or Photo slideshow section will need to finalise them before September 20, or they will lose the projects. Those videos already published with Video Editor or Photos slideshows will be unaffected. Those that want to download their videos from the Video Editor will be able to do so in 720p resolution, or, they can use Google Takeout to get them in original quality.
As we mentioned, not all editing is disappearing from the YouTube platform - a boon for amateur users or those that want to make minor adjustments without re-uploading an entire video again. Creators will be able to continue to utilise the Enhancements feature, which can be found in the Video Manager section. Enhancements allows for edits like trimming, blurring, and filters.
Google is pointing to the innumerable free and paid third-party editing tools that creators can utilise in place of its Video Editor and Photos slideshow features. It is pointing to the Creator Community and Creator Hub for more information.