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Video autoplays on YouTube if you click on channel name (autoplay disabled)

minmax
Making moves

Per title, if you have blocked video autoplay on YouTube, video will still autoplay on channel home page if you click on the channel name on the home page results. I know it sounds confusing so here are the steps.

1. Go to YouTube's home page.

2. Ideally you should see a list of videos on your home page.

3. Click on the CHANNEL NAME of a video. Do not click the video thumbnail or the video title. Click on the CHANNEL NAME, which is below the video title.

4. This step requires that the channel you clicked on has a video posted on their channel home page. Not every channel have this. If you click on a channel that does not posted a video on their home page, you will not be able to reproduce this. In this case, go back to the YouTube home page and try selecting another video. So if you select a channel which has a video on its home page, the video will autoplay (it will be a thumbnail size) despite video autoplay is blocked in the settings.

5. While the video is playing on the channel's home page, refresh the page. Now the video will not autoplay.

I have included a screen recording of the issue. I select "Saturday Night Live" (the name of the channel below the video title) on YouTube's home page. When the channel's home page loads, the video thumbnail will start playing. However, at 11 seconds I refresh the page and now the video will not autoplay.

Aside from this issue, the "block video from autoplay" works correctly on YouTube. So if you click on a video thumbnail or a video title, once you go to the video's page, the video will not autoplay. Which is correct.

Video in Dropbox:

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/vmv6mndnhgor8vejmcr0o/ff-autoplay.mov?rlkey=8576qtbsfjjl5ezuh7y29eijo...

7 REPLIES 7

Agentvirtuel
Collaborator

Hello

Allow or block media autoplay in Firefox
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/block-autoplay

Configuration Editor for Firefox
https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/about-config-editor-firefox
Enter a search term autoplay

media.autoplay.default 1 this correspond to the situation Block Audio
media.autoplay.default 5 this correspond to the situation Block Audio and Video
media.autoplay.default 0 this correspond to the situation Allow Audio and Video

About, media.autoplay.blocking-policy, you can try 2

minmax
Making moves

Thank you for your response!

I'm curious, however, have you actually tried the info you recommended? Because none of them seem work.

  1. Perform the settings you have recommended (by also setting the "about:config > media.autplay.blocking-policy = 2")
  2. Restart Firefox (just for the heck of it).
  3. Go to YouTube
  4. In the YouTube search box, enter "saturday night live"
  5. In the search results, click the Saturday Night Live channel (should be the first hit at the top)
  6. The video in the thumbnail on SNL's home page will start playing regardless of the video blocking settings.

FF v137.0

Agentvirtuel
Collaborator

Hello

https://www.youtube.com/embed/yFno5ZlQFHo
Also take a look at https://connect.mozilla.org/t5/ideas/add-a-way-to-block-autoplay-video/idc-p/47286/highlight/true#M2...

Other feedback https://www.youtube.com/embed/9oTiYCo9HOE

A working environment (user) in a given situation does not correspond to a working environment (other user) in a given situation, so understand, that it is difficult to give an opinion.

If you wish to try/test create a new profile (to see if)
about:profiles https://support.mozilla.org/en-US/kb/profile-manager-create-remove-switch-firefox-profiles
Your current profile, this is the profile you're currently using; it can't be deleted (1)
Create a new profil (2) simply enter the name you want and click Finish to create this new profile, then restart Firefox

(2) this is your new profile and don't remove your profile (1)

To return to your profile (1), Set as default profile, then restart Firefox.

minmax
Making moves

I also attached a screen recording.

After I search for "Saturday Night Live" and click on the channel name, it takes me to Saturday Night Live's home page. On the home page, there's a small thumbnail video that starts to play (at around 10 seconds).

However, when I click that thumbnail video and I'm taken to the video's page (at around 27 seconds), the video will not start to play. So FF behaves correctly in that case.

I think when video autoplay is disabled, somehow FF interprets that thumbnail video on the home page differently. I use Brave most of the time and it behaves correctly. FF should behave the same. If autoplay is disabled it should stop a video from autoplaying regardless whether it's a small thumbnail or a full page video.

PS: It is interesting that when you went to SNL's home page, there was no video presented to you on the page.

https://www.dropbox.com/scl/fi/ebq2yre2p27fbc5ltpe6j/ff-autoplay-2.mov?rlkey=iaw0sowaa9ukggldke8qff1...

Agentvirtuel
Collaborator

Agentvirtuel
Collaborator

@minmax wrote:
PS: It is interesting that when you went to SNL's home page, there was no video presented to you on the page.

Under vpn, the geolocation at the instan t, United States this is not my real ip, then i stopped the vpn.
https://www.youtube.com/embed/sdml2k9Vhjc

minmax
Making moves

Thanks, I filed a bug. There was already a bug report on this.

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