For an app as popular as YouTube, you'd think its design would be set in stone. Instead, Google is constantly changing and adapting it to fit whatever niche the company has become obsessed with, whether it be TikTok-style short clips or sending direct payments to a creator. YouTube has yet to receive a Material You makeover, but some new buttons currently in testing on Android have us wondering if it's not too far away.

As spotted by the Google News Telegram group, YouTube is giving the row of buttons below a video an all-new look, directly pulled from the Material Design 3 guidelines released back in October. Although the thin line-art icons are sticking around — you didn't really think they'd disappear so soon, did you? — they're now surrounded by pill-shaped bubbles, including a combined tab for likes and the newly-hidden dislike count.

Left: New button designs. Right: Current buttons.

The result looks a little odd right now, essentially shrinking the height of the bar without compressing any information. Rather than use these new buttons to eliminate the need to scroll between options, YouTube has actually lengthened the bar, placing text like "Download" next to its corresponding icon rather than below it. This drawback seems more like a limitation of Material Design 3 (effectively the official design name for Material You) than anything, as keeping the current layout of the buttons would require a circular outline rather than the pill shape used throughout most of Google's updated apps.

These outlines are our first hint that YouTube might actually get some kind of Material You support after all, though it's entirely possible the app sticks to some basic MD3 design cues and leaves the rest behind. We still don't know when these buttons might make their way out to users. With any luck, dynamic themes and a redesigned navigation bar aren't too far behind.