YouTube Moves Subscriptions Off the Bottom Bar

If your thumb goes straight to the Subscriptions button every time you open YouTube on your phone, get ready to retrain it. YouTube is moving that tab out of the bottom bar for the first time in years, and it's adding a new feed you build by typing what you want to watch.

What happened

On 22 October 2026, YouTube announced a refreshed Home page on its official @UpdatesFromYT account, and 9to5Google spotted what it means for the Android and iPhone apps. Subscriptions leaves the bottom bar, where it has sat since 2017, and becomes "Subs" in a new top bar on the Home tab, right after Home.

Next to it you'll find dedicated feeds for Live and Music, plus Movies & TV if you have an active paid subscription. According to 9to5Google, the redesign also drops YouTube's side navigation drawer.

The second change is custom feeds. You tap "+" at the top of Home and describe the topic, channels or mood you're after, and YouTube builds a feed for it that stays pinned in the top bar. Free accounts can keep three active custom feeds and Premium members can keep eight. They sync between the app and the web.

Why it matters

Honestly, the Subs move bugs me more than the AI feature excites me. The channels you chose to follow are now one row among feeds that YouTube's algorithm picks for you. It's still one tap away, just in a different place, but it nudges you toward recommendations rather than the creators you actually subscribed to.

Custom feeds are more interesting. They replace the old topic chips with something you control, and a prompt like "short guitar lessons for beginners" is a lot more useful than a generic "Music" chip. The catch is availability. YouTube's help page calls it experimental and limits it to signed-in viewers in the US using English, with watch and search history switched on.

What to do

• Update the YouTube app. The new layout is rolling out gradually, so don't worry if yours still looks the same.
• When it lands, look for Subs at the top of the Home tab instead of the bottom bar.
• If you're eligible, try one custom feed for something you search often. Prompts expire after 30 days without use, according to YouTube's help page.
• If you keep search history off for privacy, know that custom feeds won't work until you turn it on.

If YouTube ads bother you more than the layout, I explain what network-level ad blocking can and can't do for YouTube in my Private DNS on Android guide.

Sources: Updates From YouTube on X, YouTube Help, with reporting from 9to5Google.