Despite its name, YouTubes Stats for Nerds feature isnt just for nerds.
That mumbo jumbo, however, can prove to be quite useful.
Current / Optimal Res:The videos current resolution versus its original resolution.
Volume / Normalized:The current volume of the video youre watching and how much the audio is normalized.
Normalization matches louder and quieter parts of the sound more closely to protect the listeners ears and speakers.
The parenthesis shows how loud the video is compared to YouTubes baseline.
Codecs:The medias video and audio compression codecs.
Color: This shows the current color range of the content youre watching.
Connection Speed:Your devices data pipe connection.
connection Activity:The data transmission from YouTubes servers to your machine.
The higher a videos resolution, the higher the web link activity will be.
Mystery Text:A long string of text whose meaning is not clear at first.
Date: The current date and time for the viewer.
YouTube doesn’t disclose exactly what Mystery Text is, and many have guessed at its meaning.
t:1759.84: The video’s current timestamp, in seconds.
b:1459.421-1884.549: Denotes the video’s buffer range, in seconds.
1459.421 is the beginning of the buffer, while 1884.549 is the end.
It shows how much of the video is actually buffered.
P: This appears whenever the video is paused.
pbs:3354: pbs stands for “Playback Session,” and identifies the current session of video playback.
Some of this information is neat, but most of it will look like techno gibberish for average users.
That doesnt mean it isnt helpful, however.
The internet information is useful if youre having playback issues and cant pinpoint whats causing it.
However, Stats for Nerds main use is for aiding YouTubes engineers with troubleshooting bugs.
Desktop (Windows, Linux, Mac)
Open YouTube.com in your internet tool of choice.
Start watching a video.
Right-hit the video once to kick off the video menu.
SelectStats for Nerdsto toggle the overlay.
Android
In the YouTube app, go toSettings > General > Enable Stats for nerds.
Next, play a video.
Tap the three-dotMorebutton in the video player.
iOS and iPadOS
kick off the YouTube app
Go toSettings > General.
Tap the video, then tap controls gear, then tapAdditional controls.
fire up the app on your rig.
Bring up the video playback controls (usually by pressing your remote/controllers default select button).
Tab over and select configs.
Scroll over and selectStats for Nerds.
