YouTube upgrades its ‘erase song’ tool to remove copyrighted music only

YouTube is trying to make it easy for its creators to remove songs from their videos and resolve copyright claims. In a new Creator Insider video, the website has announced that it has released an upgraded “erase song” tool that has the capability to remove music from video segments without deleting other audio, such as conversations, as well.

When creators get a copyright claim for music, YouTube gives them the option to trim out the affected segment or to replace the song with an approved one in its audio library. Creators can’t monetize that particular video until they resolve the claim. The website has been testing its “erase song” tool for a while, but in the video, the company says it hasn’t been as accurate as it would like. To solve that problem, it redesigned the tool so that it now uses an AI-powered algorithm to accurately detect and remove copyrighted music from videos.

Still, YouTube admits that the tool might not always work. If a song is particularly hard to remove, presumably due to audio quality or the presence of other sounds while it’s playing, creators may have to resort to other options. In addition to being able to trim out the offending segment or to replace its song, creators will also be able to mute that part of their video through the new erase tool.

The website’s upgraded erase song tool will be available in YouTube Studio in the coming weeks.