YouTube's movie rental Llibrary grows quietly

It looks like YouTube is expanding its quiet and low-profile movie rental service. In addition to the movies from the Sundance Festival that were added back in January of the current year, the website is now also offering selections from over 500 other content partners. And what is interesting is that not all of them are flicks which can be termed "obscure".

A glance through the YouTube "store" reveals that popular movies like Reservoir Dogs, Precious, Pi and The Cove are listed and can be rented.


The films that can be rented in ranges of both price and rental window, and the most common rental window which is currently being witnessed is for 24 hours after a viewer begins watching. Also, there are 48 hours, 72 hours and 7 days windows as well.

Most of the movies fall in the rent range of $1.99 to $3.99, and some videos are available for as less as 99 cents.

There is no fixed or predictable pattern for the service which can be irritating and annoying for the viewers, but a good thing from rights-holders, as it allows them to determine a price and rental window for every offering.

The expansion of the service has been termed as "neat" and "not surprising".