YouTube'south silent autoplay feature—found in the home and subscriptions tabs—isn't the most intuitive concept Google's ever cooked upwardly. For starters, if a video autoplays for too long while you're scrolling through your feed, the video gets added to your history, fifty-fifty if you don't click on it. And then if you decide to watch the video at a after time, it starts right where the autoplay left off, instead of back at the beginning. These quirks alone are enough to make you want to pull the plug on autoplay altogether. Luckily, there is a way to banish it from your YouTube feeds.

Deactivate autoplay on YouTube'south habitation and subscriptions tabs

The autoplay setting for the abode and subscriptions tabs is incredibly like shooting fish in a barrel to miss if you don't know where to expect. First, open up up the YouTube app on your favorite device. So instead of navigating to the "autoplay" tab within the Settings menu (where y'all'd await it to be), head over to "Full general." 5 rows downwards, you'll run across "Muted playback in feeds."

Every bit Android Police'southward Rita already explained in a previous story, this setting is very confusingly named. Instead of muting or unmuting video in your feed (autoplay content is always muted until you tap on the video), this choice actually controls whether or not the muted videos automatically start to play when scrolling through your YouTube.

In one case you tap "Muted playback in feeds," the options from in that location are pretty directly frontwards: The default "Always on" mode means that videos volition start to autoplay in your feeds every bit long as an net connection is available. "Wi-Fi only" is reserved for those connected to a Wi-Fi network. Then "Off" will forbid videos from autoplaying in your feeds, period. Choose that last option, and voilà, no more than unwatched videos filling your history.

Pros and cons of leaving autoplay activated

If y'all're yet on the fence virtually what to practice with autoplay, there are valid arguments for either side.

On one hand, autoplay allows you to preview a video — complete with closed captions — to help you determine if the video is worth watching in total. This feature may as well help y'all discover new videos that ordinarily wouldn't have piqued your interest.

On the other hand, limiting or even deactivating autoplay can help conserve data for phones running on metered connections. Without that little autoplay teaser, you lot also lower your risk of being sucked into a video that you otherwise wouldn't have cared to view. Finally, autoplay ensures only the videos you actually scout state in your history.

Whichever option fits your needs boils down to personal preference. Luckily, YouTube gives users the freedom to choose, even if that choice is filed in the wrong settings menu under a misleading name.

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About The Author

Zach Laidlaw (485 Articles Published)

Zach is an experienced writer, self-proclaimed tech addict, and hobbyist gamer. Throughout his career, he'south worked for Samsung and Apple, giving him a broad view of the mobile tech landscape at large. To learn more, connect on Twitter @ztlaidlaw

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