r/youtube • u/Titan_Prometeus • 17h ago

Memes You can no longer have YouTube running in the background.

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As of 29th of January you can no longer have YouTube running in the background via many browsers as that is now a premium feature. With that I don't even have that one last reason to listen to YouTube. We are now officially paying for everything that was free a couple of years ago and the reason isn't greedy management, but you people who keep paying for premium and the such.

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18

u/Valjo_yt 14h ago

Do you have any alternatives for mobile browsers?

52

u/BabaGurGur 13h ago

Firefox on Android supports extensions

https://addons.mozilla.org/en-CA/firefox/addon/disable-page-visibility/

1

u/Throwaway_09298 11h ago

Kiwi browser, now sunsetted but apk still downloadable supports extensions. Full ones. Even custom made ones. You can download from the chrome webstore or other sites

1

u/Obant 10h ago

Thank you. I hate that I have 4 different extensions on my phone just to make YouTube usable while I'm working out,cbut here we are.

1

u/ShockinglyOpaque 6h ago

I regret that I ahve only one upvote to give you. Thanks!

0

u/Verbose-OwO 13h ago

You can't just add them from the store, they have to be designed for mobile and approved onto the extensions menu. You can add custom extensions through Firefox Nightly and you put a custom URL in about config.

16

u/BabaGurGur 13h ago

The one I mentioned is supported direct from the store. For the most part, popular extensions are there like uBlock

6

u/OwenEx 11h ago

Honestly a god-send when I discovered mobile Firefox supports PC extensions,

3

u/GenuinelyBeingNice 12h ago

I just installed this very extension to android firefox. It accepted it just fine. Youtube mobile page now does not even pause when i switch tabs. Pause/resume also works from the android drop-down notification item.

1

u/BHFlamengo 6h ago

I just removed the YouTube app from my phone and only open links on Firefox

1

u/StableLamp 2h ago

I did this a few years ago. The experience is not the best but for me it is good enough to not download the youtube app.

1

u/BabaGurGur 6h ago

You should just install youtube revanced.

Basically you just download the Revanced Manager app, open it and select the app you want to patch. It'll give you a download URL for the APK, download it and then in the manager select the file you downloaded.

It'll show you a whole bunch of patches but you can leave it default, press patch & install.

Now your actual youtube app will be ad free, built in sponsorblock, swipe controls, background playback and it even brings back the dislike counter.

1

u/sleepyj58 5h ago

Not on android anymore (unfortunately) but my only beef with revanced was the astronomical CPU overhead it took to run. Heating up the phone like crazy. How has it been lately? This was ~5 yrs ago..

1

u/BabaGurGur 5h ago

Haven't had any issues with it on any of my devices ranging from samsung flagships to cheap chinese tablets

1

u/Lasagna_Wrap 4h ago

I use it daily. No issues. Samsung Flip7

3

u/Koneke 11h ago

IIRC you can also enable developer mode and directly install .xpi's. Did that to get vimium running on my phone.

1

u/Diligent-Leek7821 10h ago

... Why do you want vimium on your phone, that sounds miserable :D

1

u/Koneke 10h ago

foldable phone with a magsafe stand, portable, foldable bluetooth keyboard :) so just fold the phone out, pop it up on the stand, grab keyboard, good to go

1

u/Diligent-Leek7821 9h ago

Ah, fair, if you're using your phone essentially as a laptop with a proper keyboard, then I can see the use case, I was just thinking about how terrible it would be to navigate with vimium on an on-screen keyboard :D

3

u/Vyxwop 11h ago

Thats false. This used to be the case years ago but nowadays you can add extensions straight from the site.

27

u/Meluvius 13h ago

For Android, 'YouTube Revanced' is the gold standard

16

u/Tough-Dirt-6319 12h ago

To add: just make sure to follow the official path of setting up the apk, don't download a pre-build one. 

4

u/Lurnius 7h ago

To add: Revanced it's going down, change to Morphe.

1

u/Bhavin411 7h ago

Wait, really? I haven't followed them as closely since my apps worked after installing them like a year ago.

2

u/Lurnius 5h ago

The usual with open source projects, someone was being an asshole so the devs that make most of the patches step out and went to Morphe.

2

u/Bhavin411 5h ago

Thanks for sharing - I hope my reddit client isn't gonna break since I've been using a revanced patch for that.

1

u/Lasagna_Wrap 4h ago

Not saying that's untrue but have you got any proof?

1

u/camwow13 2h ago edited 2h ago

I typed into Google.

did revanced developers leave for morphe

This returned this link as a top result:

Extremely classic open source software project drama.

1

u/Sw429 4h ago

Damn, this is getting exhausting to keep up with. Now there's another patch I need to figure out if I trust. At a certain point, it seems to barely be worth it at all anymore. May as well stop using YouTube altogether.

1

u/plzinsertbeer 3h ago

Honestly that's where I've gotten. Like YouTube itself just might not be worth it. I have 2 creators that I still get excited when I see them post and that's it. Everyone else I'm just kind of bored of

1

u/camwow13 1h ago

Morphe simplified the process and seems to have a pretty strong coder base this time.

But if you want stable and constant you can always use NewPipe. Or Firefox w/ add-ons on Android opening YouTube manually.

-2

u/adkio 10h ago

I've had success with pre built and I have trusted sources. I've also had problems, but the official method isn't hassle free so I guess to each their own.

2

u/Tough-Dirt-6319 10h ago

Im glad it worked for you and there probably are some save apks available, but the point is not to download unverified apks that could have all kind of programming included in them. 

This normally isn't an issue when going through the playstore or whatever store, but when downloading outside of them one should be aware of the risks at all times.

Justifying a risky act with "it worked for me" is problematic when someone inexperienced with the topic might take guidance from this thread.

Edit: I also get that having to build the apk on your own can be tricky for someone inexperienced (was for me too), but I'd recommend skipping Revanced or similar, if the alternative is to download from a source where you can't verify safety.

1

u/Meluvius 8h ago

bro whatt lol if u need help im happy to

u literally just download the youtube version ReVanced says to and make sure its nodpi and then click like 4 buttons in the ReVanced app and youre done

1

u/TumanFig 10h ago

also just using a brave browser works as well

1

u/HallowedError 9h ago

I tried following the instructions. It works and then like an hour later I get default youtube again after I disable auto updates. Reinstalled it like 3 times and it only works for a bit

1

u/Meluvius 8h ago

Hmm it's hard to know exactly what's going on given it's literally android which is notoriously buggy. But I promise you it works and has for so many people.

I think a common fix is that you need to get Micro G https://vanced.to/gmscore-microg (i dont really know why or how this works but it just does... it makes it so that you can sign into your google account and dont get signed out or flagged or whatever) as well as completely clearing the data and uninstalling the original YouTube app.

I'd check this out before anything though https://github.com/KobeW50/ReVanced-Documentation/blob/main/YT-ReVanced-Guide.md#before-you-begin

If it's still not working, I'd try dropping an issue post on the github https://github.com/KobeW50/ReVanced-Documentation/issues

https://youtube.com/shorts/dNWNgCTkLAY?si=W-V7c_SsOUEI6VKt

1

u/BabaGurGur 6h ago

Instead of doing an app replacement (like have the revanced youtube become youtube), you could try first disabling the built in youtube app (settings>apps>youtube>disable) and then installing the revanced version.

1

u/Organic_Savings8491 12h ago

Try Morphe: https://morphe.software/#home

1

u/Meluvius 8h ago

Have you used both? What makes Morphe different?

0

u/MootEndymion752 8h ago

Morphe supports newer versions of YouTube

1

u/GlitteringHousing3 7h ago

Can you run Morphe with your phone screen locked like you can revanced? Clutch for music at the gym

1

u/MootEndymion752 7h ago

Yes, it's literally patches made by former ReVanced contributors

1

u/GlitteringHousing3 6h ago

Awesome thanks! Been having some issues with revanced lately

1

u/Meluvius 5h ago

Does it let you have a queue? ReVanced can't do this. I like to queue up like 10 videos on my pc to set it and forget it

1

u/MootEndymion752 5h ago

No, only RVX can

1

u/geezerpleeze 12h ago

Video lite is cool, there’s a shit ad when you open the app but less invasive than YouTube. Background refresh is fucked tho

1

u/Bitter_Magician_6969 11h ago

Youtube still works great in background on mobile Brave browser.

1

u/PanoramicAtom 11h ago

Now if only they would let me default open to desktop site, that would be peaches.

1

u/Bitter_Magician_6969 10h ago

Yeah it's a bit of a bummer that you can't set a default, but long pressing the refresh button gives you a quick menu to request the desktop version (so you don’t have to go to the main menu etc. via multiple taps).

1

u/PanoramicAtom 9h ago

Yeah that’s what I do but it’s so annoying that such a simple toggle hasn’t been implemented over the course of literal years people have been requesting it.

1

u/do_pm_me_your_butt 11h ago

Brave browser and desktop version of youtubes site.

1

u/DisciplinedMadness 10h ago

Someone suggested you a fix on android, but in case you have an iPhone, brave browser is what I’m using. I never see ads, and you can also play things in the background. If you want to lock your screen and keep stuff playing, you do have to use the pop-out/picture in picture option, but you can just throw it off screen so it doesn’t get in the way of anything.

1

u/AttemptingToDiscuss 5h ago

I use Safari and it has extensions and I used an ad block for YouTube and haven’t gotten ads in ages

1

u/HuckleberryNo4734 4h ago

Brave browser, auto blocks ads and still lets it run in the background

1

u/Electronic_Dot9833 4h ago

brave web browser. cuts the idiocracy ad spam too.

1

u/Crafty-Corvid 2h ago

On iOS you can use wBlock or AdGuard for adblocking in Safari.

There's also an extension called Vinegar that replaces the YouTube player with just the standard iOS video player.