After a year of feuding, Amazon and Google have finally broken the virtual trade embargo between the two companies, Amazon has announced. Starting later this year, Amazon Fire TV and Amazon Fire TV Cube will have access to YouTube via the native YouTube app, and you’ll be able to watch Amazon Prime Video on Google Chromecast.
In broad terms, that means you’ll be able to watch everything available on Amazon’s video service on Android TV, Chromecast and Google Home Hub devices (as well as any other device that supports Chromecast Built-in), plus watch YouTube on Amazon Fire TV and Amazon Fire TV Edition Smart TVs, with support for the YouTube TV and YouTube Kids apps coming later this year.
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While this will be a big change for Amazon Prime Video watchers who haven’t been able to cast Amazon content to their screens since, well, ever, it might be less of a boon for Amazon device owners who have been able to watch YouTube through the Amazon Silk browser, despite Google pulling the native YouTube app last year.
The native YouTube app not might have been missed, but YouTube TV and YouTube Kids certainly have, so there's something to be gained by both sides.
There is one caveat, however: the only device that seems to be left out of the agreement is the Amazon Echo Show, which likely won’t have YouTube returned to it at all – a strange move everything considered.
A war with no winners
While the war between the two tech giants has been brewing for what seems like forever, the battle came to a head when Google pulled YouTube from the Amazon Fire TV – likely in response to Amazon's refusal to sell Chromecast, Nest and Google Home Devices on the Amazon store.
Amazon resumed sales of those products after the YouTube app was pulled, but neither company allowed their services to be used by the other with customers feeling the brunt of the software embargo.
The easing of tensions today represents a period of Detente for the companies and could be the foundation of a long-lasting peace ... as long as Amazon keeps selling Google products.
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