What’s better than Crunchyroll? Well, according to them, Crunchyroll Beta is. At least, if you pay for it.

Crunchyroll Beta-chan and kitty.
Crunchyroll-chan seems excited, but should you?

Crunchyroll announces that they’re basically testing out the Beta version of their site. Currently, Crunchyroll Beta is only available to Premium subscribers, and only for a randomly selected 20% of them. However, Crunchyroll does plan to make this Beta available to all subscribers, including free subscribers. Eventually.

To opt into Crunchyroll Beta, you have to click on a header image or pop-ups that appear on the Crunchyroll website. Once you do that, you can choose to opt into it. Or not, if you don’t want to.

Crunchyroll Beta: The Details

Crunchyroll Beta homepage.
Well, it looks more colorful, at least.

So what’s so great about Crunchyroll Beta? Well, apparently, the Beta version features a host of new features, and updated version of old features. These features include a “mobile responsive experience, updated homepage, redesigned browse and watch pages, new search capabilities and the brand new Crunchylists feature”.

Another image of the homepage.
Definitely feeling the colors.

Apparently, the homepage of Crunchyroll Beta will feature a new user interface, “redesigned to fit the needs of the anime community”. What Crunchyroll means by this is apparently personalized anime selections for you, based on what shows you watched previously. Presumably, it’s similar to what YouTube uses to recommend videos to you. Other improvements include being able to navigate “seamlessly” to their watchlist, specific anime, and even specific episodes within a show.

Crunchyroll being more like YouTube.
Ahhh, just like YouTube.

Crunchyroll Beta will also have enhanced search functions to make it easier for users to find specific anime. However, Crunchyroll will still offer curated lists, apparently handpicked by “anime experts” working for Crunchyroll. Considering that they’re likely anime fans themselves, you can probably trust the content in these curated lists.

Crunchyroll Beta curated list: "Girls just wanna have fun".
So this is a genre now? I approve.

Crunchyroll Beta users can also create unique usernames, just like they’ve always been able to. However, they can now choose to display avatars and header images in their profile pictures. These images will be from anime series, but no mention is made of uploading your own images. Ah, oh well, maybe they’ll come up with it one of these days.

Crunchyroll Beta news page.
Hope this will be on the mobile app too.

Lastly, Crunchyroll Beta will debut the new Crunchylists feature. Apparently, this will allow users to create their own curated lists, and organize the list however they choose. While I have no doubt this will result in a lot of messy lists, this could also result in some works of art. It’ll be interesting to see what users will create, once this goes live for free users as well.

Conclusion

Crunchyroll Beta is launching, but only for a small number of premium subscribers. If you want to opt into this beta program, you might want to hurry up before the slots are all filled up. Or if you don’t want to pay for a subscription, you can just wait for it to eventually go live for free users. It’s your move.

Source: Crunchyroll