At its annual TwitchCon event earlier this year, Twitch, a livestreaming service owned by Amazon, declared its intention to enter the vertical video market.
AppSensa, a market intelligence provider, has reported that the initial alpha tests have been implemented with a limited number of streamers.

The company recently discovered references to the vertical video experiments and information regarding the features that these new feeds would provide in a recent build. Twitch would become more competitive with other popular vertical video services, such as TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts, once the feature is completely implemented.

At this time, Twitch’s tests are not widely available, as AppSensa’s research only identified a small number of references in the app’s code that indicated the tests would initially concentrate on “a few streamers.”
The firm was also able to identify a vertical theater mode with dedicated user interface elements and a means to transition between Twitch’s classic and new vertical video formats, although it was unable to identify which ones.

Users will be presented with user education dialogs upon their initial encounter with the feature, which will inform them that “vertical video is now available.”
These dialogs will also remind users that the feature is still in the testing phase and that they have the option to restore the classic view at any time.

AppSensa also observed that the current implementation includes permission management for both the camera and microphone access, as required by mobile platforms. This suggests that the app will be utilized for livestreams.

When contacted for comment, Twitch declined to provide additional information regarding the experiments, stating only that the company had previously announced during its keynote at TwitchCon Rotterdam earlier this year that it would commence testing with a limited number of channels during the summer.
Additionally, a spokesperson stated that the experiments would be extended to a greater number of consumers at a later date in the year.

The company also disclosed that it would experiment with dual-format and 2K broadcasting on a limited number of channels during TwitchCon.