YouTube will also lower its streaming quality in response to EU's request to help reduce strain on internet bandwidth, according to Reuters.

YouTube in SD
Earlier this week, European Commissioner Thierry Breton urged Netflix and other major streaming services to "switch to standard definition when HD is not necessary". Netflix has said that it will reduce bitrates across all streams in Europe.

Google's YouTube says that it will also reduce its streaming quality in Europe by making SD resolution the default.

- "We are making a commitment to temporarily switch all traffic in the EU to standard definition by default," the company said in a statement to Reuters.

However, it is not clear if users will be able to manually adjust streaming quality on YouTube. At this time, the YouTube player in our browser still automatically jumps to 1080p.

The report from Reuters said that the decision was made after European Commissioner Thierry Breton spoke to Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai and YouTube CEO Susan Wojcicki.

- Source: Reuters