Comments on: YouTube Officially Adds High Quality Option to Video Embeds

By: CJ

CJ — Fri, 19 Jun 2009 18:19:00 +0000

I’m having simliar issues to Daniel, I have achieved the forced HQ playback in the past, but now when I append the “&ap=%2526fmt%3D18″ code to the embed, it has no effect.

It is not screwing up the functionality of the HQ button, but it is not playing back in HQ automatically.

Maybe YouTube changed the variables on this or there is another way to do it? If anyone has any ideas, they would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks,
CJ

By: Daniel

Daniel — Sat, 11 Apr 2009 09:30:11 +0000

Hi Julie,

Thanks so much for posting your very helpful (not to mention professional) tutorials! Sadly though I can’t seem to reproduce your results. I’m trying to embed a video (that “qualifies” for HQ by YouTube standards) in a WordPress blog, much like yours. When I add the “&ap=%2526fmt%3D18″ snippet it doesn’t seem to do anything for me. In fact, worse still! It seems to screw up the functionality of the HQ button altogether!

Hmm could YouTube be in on the hack? I know you’re thinking this probably has something to do with my YouTube account settings but actually I’ve deleted all of my browser cookies to try and simulate a non-YouTuber experience.

Any thoughts? Is there an update I haven’t read?

Thanks!

Daniel

By: David

David — Fri, 06 Feb 2009 21:30:33 +0000

I have noticed that on some videos the HQ doesn’t work on its own. You still need to add the &ap=%2526fmt%3D18 code to it to force it to display. I’ve uploaded several videos recently. Both were HD quality. Both had the Watch in HD option at the bottom. However when embedded one would display in HQ and the other would not.

To add to this, the one that wouldn’t display in HQ (even though it said it was displaying in HQ when you clicked play), if you would click the “Watch in Normal” in the player itself, it would not change the quality at all. BUT when you click the Watch in HQ afterwards it would say HQ is not available.

There was no reason for this to occur at all. Both were encoded with the same format and at the same time. However after adding this code &ap=%2526fmt%3D18, it would display it in HQ with no problem.

By: admin

admin — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 05:03:13 +0000

Mike – You know, that’s funny — I hadn’t even thought about a situation where someone doesn’t have a YouTube account. HA!!! Goes to show you how “YouTube focused” I am these days! (What!? You don’t have a YouTube account!? Surely you can’t be serious!) LOL

It’s a great point though: what is the default when someone hasn’t changed their settings (or, for that matter, doesn’t HAVE settings b/c they have no account!)? I’m now wondering if perhaps the default is the first option out of those three in the YouTube playback setting options — that it simply defaults to “Choose my video quality dynamically based on the current connection speed.”

I would imagine that has to be the actual default — that the computer detects what to do unless told otherwise. (Example: I have a high-speed connection, but was given a low-quality version on my own blog today when I went in and changed my settings over on YouTube to the lower-quality option; when I changed it back, the default was high-quality).

Thank you so much for bringing this point up for consideration.
~Julie

By: mike's video editing

mike's video editing — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 03:12:57 +0000

I’d probably leave HQ at default but if the source is HD, and when the content is good enough for your audience, I’d be inclined to embed with “&ap=%2526fmt%3D22″.
My other question is though, how many people who watch embedded videos actually have a YouTube account, and if they do, how many would change their default player setting?

By: Sandra DeLarosa

Sandra DeLarosa — Thu, 29 Jan 2009 00:46:26 +0000

Thanks Julie for being so on top of things! I will start using this today!