YouTube Vanced, a popular project that modifies the official YouTube app to add an arsenal of features has now been discontinued. First launched in 2018, the team behind the modded app announced the shutdown on its Telegram channel citing “legal reasons”.
The website to download Vanced Manager will be taken down in a few days, but Vanced has made it clear that currently-installed versions will continue working for about two more years but won’t be receiving any more updates. “We know this is not something you wanted to hear, but it’s something we need to do,” said the team in the announcement.
Vanced has also revealed to The Verge that the actual reason behind the shutdown is that Google had recently sent a cease and desist letter, clarifying that “we were asked to remove all references to ‘YouTube’, change the logo, and remove all links related to YouTube products.” Surely enough, all their official channels had recently been updated with a new logo that removes any likeless from YouTube’s.
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Other than ad-blocking, YouTube Vanced offers background-playing, theme customisation, SponsorBlock, and more recently, the dislike button that was removed by YouTube. The team behind the project has also created a similar app to provide an ad-free experience for YouTube Music.
(Source: Vanced/Twitter, The Verge.)
