Chrome Beta 54 Now Lets You Play Videos in the Background on Android
Unless you’re using YouTube Red , background video playback on Android is probably pretty rare. This changes in the new beta version of Chrome, which lets you play videos from web pages in the background. Even YouTube.
In Chrome Beta 54, if you play a video in a tab and then leave Chrome, you will see a small notification showing the video you were watching. It pauses automatically (presumably so that you no longer get annoyed by auto-playing ads when you try to return from a website), but you can click Play to start playing again. Audio streams can also play in the background, but they won’t pause when you exit Chrome.
As Android Police points out, video playback now even works on YouTube, which is very useful. However, since background playback is a paid feature of YouTube Red, it is likely that it will be blocked in the near future. However, you can enjoy it as a small reward for testing the beta.
Chrome Beta | Google Play Store via Android Police