11mo ago

Lemmy helping Lemmy World - Youtube without Ads

I use Firefox and the uBlock Origin addon as my default browser setup. It works great..except for on youtube. I used to use it happily for youtube with all Ads blocked, but two recent youtube changes made me have to use a different browser and extension, just for youtube.

Firefox users started noticing degraded performance on youtube vs when they viewed youtube with Chrome.
uBlock Origin users in Chrome and Firefox appear to be being targeted with an intermittent covert punishment of having any videos above 360p throttled so that they buffer heavily.

So my current approach, just for youtube, is Chrome with Clear Skies ad skipper extension which gets me good performance and no ads.

What is your setup for youtube without ads?

I'm also interested in youtube alternatives, especially for music.

39 comments

I've had zero issues watching YouTube on Firefox with ublock origin. Not one warning received,no performance issues.
- I am in the U.S. and with no change on my end (Firefox w Ublock Origin) I suddenly began getting all the ads. I noticed it would only happen when I was logged into YouTube/Google though. Creating a new account solved the problem for me with no change to the browser.
  Maybe they only roll out their Ublock bypass to select groups of users at one time. Perhaps this is part of some kind of testing?
  I've also been told that if you have any other browser extensions installed, the Ublock Origin on Firefox trick may not work.
- It depends on where you live, in Europe ad blockers NEEDS to be allowed on such platforms, i would guess he lives outside and gets punished for using a more open browser
- Ditto in Canada.

Here’s my no-ads YouTube set
https://freetubeapp.io/
windows, Linux Block ads and sponsored sections, optinal invidious proxy, no YouTube login, offline subscription list
https://smartyoutubetv.github.io/
Android TV, Block ads and sponsored sections, smart tv optimized, youtube login if you want to see your subscriptions
https://newpipe.net/
android, Block ads, offline subscription list

I am using firefox with uBP and didn't noticed a single problem you mentioned. It works fine without any degraded performance or buffering even with 4k 60fps.

Firefox and uBlock Origin works just fine for blocking YouTube ads. You probably have some other add-on interfering with it that triggers the adblock detection. Restore your adblocker default setting and disable other extensions for YouTube and it should work.

use Invidious instances with the help of privacy libredirect plugin to redirect youtube links to invidious instances. you won't see another youtube ad again.

I switched to Arch Linux as my operating system a few years ago, and here I use the FreeTube app from the AUR. It's a third party frontend for YouTube, similar to Nitter for Twitter (X).
And for work (Windows) I watch YouTube via Invidious instances, e.g. https://yewtu.be also a third party frontend for YouTube
- It's a third party frontend for YouTube, similar to Nitter for Twitter (X).
  if I remember correctly, it scrapes the Youtube page directly by default, unless you explicitly enable Invidious proxy. only then it would be comparable to a third party front-end (since that's when it actually uses one).

Youtube works 👍 on Firefox Windows 11 with Ublock origin for me. I could view 1440p. No major issue. Aside from adblocking, I use Ublock origin to block tracking cookies and remove "accept cookies" banners on sites.

https://piped.video or https://viewtube.io on desktop, https://libretube.dev/ on mobile.

uBlock Origin's ben working fine for me on Firefox, but then again i don't consume that much youtube nor would i bother.

Firefox, uBlock Origin, adguard DNS, sponsorblock (crowdsourced video sections with auto skip), DeArrow (crowdsourced clickbait replacement), nyancat seek/progress bar, playback speed control, Dark Reader.
Same setup on Windows desktop and my Android devices.
I've noticed videos stopping and buffering after the first few seconds, but not always, and seemingly less so again. It was acceptable to me.

Piped on desktop
Piped

LibreTube and YouTube Revanced on Android
LibreTube
YouTube Revanced
Guide to install REvanced

uyou+ on iOS
uyou+

SmartTubeNext on Android TV
SmartTubeNext

youtube-webos on LG webOS
youtube-webos
- You missed Newpipe.
  It is one of the favourites for browsing youtube without ad blocker.
  
  I don't see the advantage of using newpipe when you can get youtube revanced.
- Do you still need to root your phone to use vanced?
  
  Nop, see the guide above. You can use it with using microg.
  BTW : vanced is not revanced.

Freetube on my PC and NewPipe on my phone. The user experience isn't as good, but no ads of any kind.

OP, treat yourself to using https://freetubeapp.io/ on desktop. It is in my opinion at least a much better experience than YT via web browser ever was.
- Does it support sponser block? Its kind of needed with many of the sponsers spots now pushing 2+ minutes for a 10 minute video.
  
  Yes it does! It has also implemented DeArrow for better/normal video thumbnails and titles. Here is a pic of some of the settings >>

I switched my useragent for youtube only to chrome and mitigated all the issues you are having

If we are talking mobile LibreTube has its kinks, but overall I'm happy with it. RiMusic for YT Music. Both on Fdroid.

Vivaldi with built-in ad block. Every once in a while YouTube changes something and ads get through for a couple of days. Then a Vivaldi update fixes it again quickly. I assume Vivaldi is too small a target for YouTube to care more.

I use a self hosted invidious instance

Chromium with uBlock origin mostly does the trick for me. There's the usual back and forth of youtube occasionally getting ads past uBlock.
Firefox with uBlock for everything else.

I dont think there is an easy solution for the lacking performance, but to force yt to use a set qulity you can use the FF addon Enhancer for YouTube (https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/enhancer-for-youtube/)

The simplest thing has been to use Brave + uBlock. NewPipe doesn't allow me to search within the same channel, so I discarded it.

Brave (yes I'm aware ya'll don't need to yap at me).
Yep seriously Brave all on its own blocks YouTube ads and no performance issues (likely thanks to being Chromium based).
To address some complaints about Brave you can uh turn that stuff off. I don't like Crypto so I... have all of that junk disabled. Doesn't bug me whatsoever. Opt in ads (for their stupid crypto coin) are disabled by default (or least where when I installed). And the CEO is a bad person (surprising I know)

For YouTube WO ads on desktop I use Brave, on mobile I use NewPipe, everything going smooth for years.

This works great: https://youtube.com/premium
This is pretty cool too: https://sponsor.ajay.app/
For TV clients: https://github.com/dmunozv04/iSponsorBlockTV
- Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
  https://piped.video/premium
  Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
  I'm open-source; check me out at GitHub.
  
  Lol, piped premium 🤣🤣🤣🤣, can't recommand it enough
  You can always donate though!

39 comments