Twitch “experimenting” with new way to customize Followed Channels lists

Twitch announced they’ll be trying out a new way for users to customize their Followed Channels list that sorts by viewing behavior instead of simply raw view count.

Until very recently, Twitch usually defaulted to sorting channels, including the channels on your following list, by the number of viewers a stream had. The more viewers watching, the higher up on the list they are. Simple as that.

This, obviously, didn’t help smaller streamers trying to grow their audience, since even if they are followed, they won’t be at the top of viewers lists who also follow multiple big personalities.

Now, Twitch has announced they’re going to be running a new experiment on some users’ Followed Channel lists that “will sort the channels based on viewing behavior instead of view count, making it easier to find channels and content relevant to you, and support smaller communities.”

There’s no word how many people they’ll be testing it on, or for how long. So if you see something strange with your Followed Channels in the next few weeks, you might just be Twitch’s latest guinea pig.

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It also doesn’t mention how the whole “based on viewing behavior” thing will work either, but it will probably take what channels you’ve been watching recently into account, and listing them accordingly, not just by how many people are watching right now.

Twitch has made several changes in 2020, including their less-than-well-received enforcement of perceived DMCA violations by banning streamers and deleting VODs. But at least this new change to Following lists seems like it could be positive for viewers and for smaller streamers alike if it works.

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2021 could be the biggest year on record for Twitch, and one of the most challenging yet if trends continue and the site just keeps getting bigger and bigger. As the new year approaches, we wouldn’t expect this to be the last “experiment” they decide to roll out and test.