New updates are being added at the bottom of this story…….
Original story (published on December 11, 2020) follows:
Admit it, we’ve all gone down the YouTube autoplay road at least once and ended up spending hours watching random content ranging from cat videos to conspiracy theories and everything in between.
Being one of the biggest video-sharing platforms in the world, there’s almost an endless catalog of videos to watch on the platform that YouTube wants viewers to get hooked on.
In fact, the more videos you end up watching the more money YouTube earns. Thus, the autoplay feature on YouTube is a genius idea from the company to encourage viewers to spend more time on the site or app.
Nonetheless, now it seems that some users are being troubled by the autoplay function on YouTube since the option does not seem to stay off even after manually disabling it multiple times.
We’ve shared some complaints about the issue by affected users below:
WHY can’t I permanently turn off autoplay until I choose to turn it on myself? It is so frustrating that it automatically turns itself back on when I open a new tab (Source)
Frickin’ YouTube Autoplay won’t turn the hell off (Source)
This is just dumb, I would like the ability to disable auto play permanently as I had just a month ago, at first it was only chorme now its happening in Edge, Especially as a Premium user you would think you would have more advanced control. (Source)
Typically, if you toggle off the autoplay feature once, YouTube remembers the setting on your account and it stays that way even after you open YouTube on a new tab or window.
However, this does not appear to be the case for some users since the autoplay function automatically switches back on rather than remaining off.
Users have to manually toggle off autoplay after opening YouTube in a new tab or after refreshing the page. While this might not be a problem for some, it can get frustrating for others.
Some users also claim that videos continue to autoplay on the Android YouTube application even if the feature is turned off in the settings.
Having said that, the issue appears to have been around for a while now, however, YouTube is yet to fix it.
Matter of fact, users are also experiencing a similar problem with the dark mode function on the web version of YouTube. Head here to know more about that.
But it seems that users won’t have to deal with the problem much longer as YouTube has acknowledged it and says that it is working on a fix for it.
While YouTube has confirmed that it is aware of the issue, the company has not shared any details as to when we can expect it to be fixed.
So we will continue to track the situation and will post an update once the problem is fixed or in case there are any other developments regarding the autoplay issue on the web version of YouTube.
In the meantime, you can check out our dedicated tracker to know about the status of all reported bugs and issues on YouTube.
Update 1 (March 05, 2022)
10:12 pm (IST): TeamYouTube on Twitter has confirmed that they have received more reports on the issue where autoplay keeps turning on.
Moreover, as a potential workaround, they recommended updating the app to the latest version or try disabling/removing extensions.
Update 2 (March 07, 2022)
09:36 pm (IST): YouTube support on Twitter has informed users that they have fixed the issue where autoplay automatically keeps turning on.
The issue where Autoplay automatically toggles on has been fixed. It’s best to clear cache & cookies on your browser before adjusting it again. Also, we’re aware of reports about Dark Theme constantly turning off, and we’re working to resolve it. Thanks for your patience. (Source)
Update 3 (March 08, 2022)
10:45 am (IST): An individual dropped a comment below this article highlighting that apart from clearing cookies and cache, one needs to clear the ‘Site settings’ too and then restart the browser and load YouTube again to fix the bug.
Delete cached browser files and cookies but most importantly “site settings” close browser, reopen and turn off autoplay, Refresh youtube page and viola works again.
Thanks for the tip, Art Moraal!
Update 4 (March 09, 2022)
05:26 pm (IST): TeamYouTube on Twitter has suggested to the affected users that they should try clearing the cache of their browser to avoid the autoplay issue.
And here’s how to do that on Chrome. Moreover, you can also try clearing cache on other browsers including Safari, Firefox, or whichever you are using.
– On your computer, open Chrome.
– At the top right, click More.
– Click More tools and then Clear browsing data.
– At the top, choose a time range. To delete everything, select All time.
– Next to “Cookies and other site data” and “Cached images and files,” check the boxes.
– Click Clear data. (Source)
Update 5 (May 11, 2022)
06:55 pm (IST): Users are still reporting (1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7) the issue where autoplay is automatically turning on.
However, a user pointed out that this problem does not happen in the Opera browser. So, a potential workaround for this issue is to use the Opera browser.
This is only happening on Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge and some one sad on Firefox but i have an Opera too and on Opera auto play stay off i prefer to use Edge and i tested in Edge, and Chrome is the same. (Source)
Update 6 (May 17, 2022)
04:31 pm (IST): One of our readers has confirmed that the Autoplay issue has also started to appear in the Opera browser. So, it seems that this issue is also spreading to other browsers (Thanks for the tip: Julia Krack!).
While the official fix for this issue is awaited, users can try installing the YouTube Redux extension. It allows users to hide the Autoplay option so that it does not trouble users during video playback. It is available for Chrome, Firefox, Opera, and MS Edge.
Update 7 (July 18, 2022)
06:24 pm (IST): More than a year and a half after the first reports related to the issue emerged, recent reports (1, 2) suggest that it is still present:
There is still no new official statement from the YouTube team in this regard.
Update 8 (July 24, 2023)
01:04 pm (IST): Some users are again reporting issues with Autoplay. According to reports (1, 2, 3), YouTube automatically plays next video even though Autoplay is turned off.
Luckily, TeamYouTube has acknowledged the issue and they are working to resolve it.
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