Out of the box it can play audio in the background, and now that extensions are available you can block ads as well. You don’t really need constantly updating 3rd party clients or questionable firewalls anymore if you just want usable youtube on a phone.
It has little to no bull shit and it can play with screen off. Age restricted videos are a problem.
If you hate the official app it’s perfect for you. Literally just your curated feed and nothing else.
You can enable those in the settings under content > show age restricted content