YouTube's new instant auto-play feature is terrible, and it's spoiling my enjoyment

A recent change to Google’s YouTube auto-play feature has been frustrating me a lot.

It’s a typical example of breaking something that wasn’t broken before, and a thinly veiled attempt to stop us watching YouTube even more, but based solely on its suggestions.

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Posts By  Ben Khalesi

The old days of auto-play

Much-needed breathing space

I watch YouTube on my television through an Apple TV, and until recently, I haven’t had a firm opinion about the auto-play feature.

When the video I was watching ended, it would show a couple of options for what to watch next, with a countdown until one automatically started to play.

It was easy to cancel this timer, and simply browse the videos that live below the control panel, in case you fancied something different than YouTube’s recommendations. In some cases, it didn’t even activate at all.

It made watching YouTube on TV quite relaxing, as I was always fully in control of what was going to play, and I had plenty of breathing space between videos to make a decision.

YouTube isn’t TikTok (no matter how important it thinks Shorts are), and my attention span stretches beyond a few seconds, so I am fine taking my time.

Then YouTube made a change and altered how auto-play videos work, and there’s nothing good about it at all.

Instant auto-play

No pause for breath

Here’s how it works now. About 20 seconds before the video you’re watching ends, a small window appears in the corner of the screen with the thumbnail for the video that’s going to play next.

The moment the video you’re watching ends, it begins. There’s no pause, it’s straight into it, and there’s not even a choice of which video it plays next, either. This is what it’s going to show you, and that’s the end of it.

Dismissing the notification in the corner doesn’t stop it either. It merely hides the window and plays the video anyway. You have to exit the video back to the main menu to avoid it. It’s infuriating for various reasons.

I’ll choose what’s next

Just give me a minute

Sometimes I want to hear the end of the video I’m watching, but to do this, I have to be ready with the Back button to stop the next video from playing. It may be a video I want to watch, but not at that moment.

Also, if it plays for a few seconds, it may never show up in my Recommended feed again because YouTube thinks I clicked out of it.

It also robs YouTube of its relaxed status. Constantly playing videos unless you tell it not to is the TikTok/Reels way of doing things, and I don’t want such high-level content bombardment in my living room.

I find I prepare myself for the silly auto-play window’s arrival, too. The Apple TV remote is in my hand, finger over the Back button, ready to press it once to get rid of the window, and then carefully time it so that I hear the last words, but still exit with a second to spare.

This is as tiring as it is annoying and incredibly distracting.

You can turn it off

All or nothing

I’m sure there will be people smugly saying, “Just turn off auto-play if you don’t like it,” but this is not the genius solution they think it is.

I never felt the need to turn off auto-play before, and there are times when I do like it playing something after what I’m watching has finished. It does it when I watch music videos, and it’s great.

Turning it off means it’s off entirely, and I don’t think that’s the solution.

The system before now worked well for me, and the new one doesn’t. Why am I forced to do without a feature I found useful sometimes, due to the new version being worse in every way?

Is research into viewing habits to blame?

Not my habits

I doubt Google makes changes for the sake of it (really, I don’t), and it likely has research that shows people stop watching at the end of a video and don’t continue.

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Forcing them to continue must extend individual watch time metrics, even if they don’t know you’re actually watching it, and the video is not playing in an empty room.

Holding attention the TikTok way must also have been a factor in the way the new auto-play feature has been engineered.

However, 180 million people in the US are expected to watch YouTube on a TV in 2026, and in 2025, a massive half of YouTube’s entire UK audience watched on a TV.

I’m not the only one who finds it annoying, so there’s a risk Google will anger a lot of people here.

What works in a mobile app doesn’t always work on a TV, and I think the updated auto-play feature is a great example.

Unfortunately, my only choice is to either continue to hone my quick-draw skills with the Back button or turn it off entirely.

Not a very consumer-friendly situation.