BLAST and YouTube have announced that the ongoing BLAST.tv Austin Major 2025 will benefit from YouTube’s Multiview feature on consoles and smart TV devices, a first for an esports broadcast.
Multiview will allow viewers to watch the Major in split screen with several feeds appearing at the same time, similar to traditional sports broadcasts and music festivals such as Coachella.
Image credit: BLAST
The technology has been around for years and is, interestingly, more familiar to traditional sports and motorsports fans than esports audiences. Sporting events and leagues such as the NFL, Champions League and even some music festivals, such as Coachella, have been using the feature to enable more content to be featured on a screen at one time. Users can even create their own Multiview channels, which include news, sports or weather channels at the same time. Still, YouTube notes that the availability of channels and features varies a lot from region to region.
The feature also allows users to switch audio feeds, allowing for a more streamlined user experience.
For the Austin Major, BLAST has created a single main Multiview channel which can be accessed from Smart TVs and consoles through the YouTube app. The Multiview channel will be available for all stages and will cover matches that are happening at the same time. This is especially helpful due to the scale of the Major, which grew from 24 to 32 teams this year.
This means that several matches will happen simultaneously, and using the YouTube Multiview, viewers can keep track of the action easily. Of course, those wanting to focus on just a single match can do so as well through the BLAST channels.
Faye Malborough, Growth Director at BLAST, said:
The BLAST.tv Austin Major is set to be one of our biggest events of the year, and it just got even more exciting with YouTube multiview. We’re thrilled to break new ground in esports broadcasting, using technology that’s already elevating the experience for fans of traditional sports and live music.
The BLAST.tv Austin Major is currently taking place in Austin, Texas, and is the first Major in the United States in seven years, after the ELEAGUE Major Boston 2018. The first stage of the Major is currently happening, and some teams, such as Fluxo and Metizport, are already out of the competition after losing three matches. HEROIC and B8 have advanced to the second stage already, with three wins each.