How to Control Your YouTube Feed: The Complete 2026 Guide

YouTube's recommendation algorithm cannot be turned off, but every surface it uses to reach you can be removed independently. Unhook (free browser extension) lets you disable the home feed, Shorts shelf, sidebar recommendations, end screens, and autoplay — individually, not all-or-nothing. News Feed Eradicator replaces the homepage with a blank page. Neither tool affects your Subscriptions feed, search, or YouTube account.

Last verified: May 26, 2026 · Reading time: 12 min

TL;DR

• YouTube’s algorithm is always running — but you can hide every surface it populates.
• Unhook — removes home feed, Shorts, sidebar, end screens, autoplay (pick any or all). Free.
• News Feed Eradicator — nuclear option; replaces the homepage with a quote. Free.
• Your Subscriptions feed is unaffected by both tools — it remains accessible and chronological.
• YouTube mobile app: no extension support. Use Kiwi Browser (Android) or Orion (iOS) for mobile control.
• Need to block YouTube completely? Freedom or Cold Turkey for that.

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What YouTube actually lets you control — and what it doesn’t

YouTube provides two native controls as of May 2026:

1. “Don’t recommend this video/channel” — hides a specific video or pauses recommendations from a channel.
2. Autoplay toggle — in the video player. Resets to on every few weeks by design.

That’s the entire native toolkit for feed control. There is no native way to:

• Disable the home feed
• Remove the Shorts shelf
• Remove sidebar recommendations while watching
• Remove end-screen recommendations
• Disable autoplay permanently
• Filter recommendations by topic or channel type

Everything beyond those two controls requires a browser extension.

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The five YouTube surfaces worth removing

Understanding which surface drives your compulsive watching helps you remove the right one:

Surface 1 — The home feed

The YouTube homepage (youtube.com) is the primary recommendation engine. It shows a grid of ~16–30 videos selected by the algorithm based on your watch history, trending content, and engagement optimization. This is where most unintended sessions start — you open YouTube to watch one specific video and the homepage pulls you into something else first.

How to remove it: Unhook → toggle off “Home feed.” The homepage becomes a search bar with your subscriptions accessible. News Feed Eradicator replaces it with a blank page or an inspirational quote.

Surface 2 — The Shorts shelf

YouTube Shorts appear in the home feed, in the sidebar, and as a dedicated tab. Shorts are designed for the same variable-reward engagement loop as TikTok — short, fast, and infinitely scrollable. If you find Shorts pulling you off your intended video, removing them is the highest-leverage single change.

How to remove it: Unhook → toggle off “Shorts.” The Shorts tab and the Shorts section in the home feed both disappear.

Surface 3 — The sidebar (“Up next”)

The sidebar on the right side of the video player shows a recommended queue of videos. After your video ends, YouTube autoplays the next recommendation. This is the mechanism responsible for the “I was going to watch one video” problem — the sidebar is the algorithmically-curated replacement for your own decision about what to watch next.

How to remove it: Unhook → toggle off “Sidebar” and “Autoplay” separately. Removing the sidebar shows nothing to the right of the player; removing autoplay stops the next video from loading automatically.

Surface 4 — End screens

The last 20 seconds of most YouTube videos overlay large clickable thumbnails recommending other content. This is the transition moment between “video is over” and “I’m done with YouTube” — the end screen is designed to make the second option harder to choose.

How to remove it: Unhook → toggle off “End screens.” End screen elements stop appearing.

Surface 5 — Autoplay

Autoplay starts the next recommended video 5 seconds after your current video ends. YouTube’s native toggle resets periodically. For permanent disabling, Unhook overrides this at the browser level on every YouTube session.

How to remove it: Unhook → toggle off “Autoplay.”

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Unhook — the precision feed control tool

Unhook is a free browser extension for Chrome and Firefox that gives you granular control over YouTube’s UI elements. Unlike nuclear options that block YouTube entirely, Unhook lets you keep using YouTube for intentional viewing while removing the algorithmic machinery.

What Unhook can remove (individually toggled):

• Home feed recommendations
• Shorts
• Sidebar / related videos
• End screens
• Autoplay
• Comments (optional)
• Trending tab
• Explore tab

Recommended configuration for most users:

• Turn off: Home feed, Shorts, Sidebar, End screens, Autoplay.
• Keep on: Search, Subscriptions, specific channel pages, watch history.

After this configuration, YouTube works as a player: you search for what you want, or browse your Subscriptions feed, or navigate directly to a channel. The algorithm no longer decides what you watch next.

Install Unhook — free, Chrome and Firefox.

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News Feed Eradicator — the nuclear option

News Feed Eradicator takes a different approach: it replaces the YouTube homepage entirely with an inspirational quote and a blank background. The home feed doesn’t load — it’s replaced before you see it.

When to choose News Feed Eradicator over Unhook:

• You don’t need the granular control Unhook provides.
• You want the homepage completely blank, not just filtered.
• You also want to remove feeds from other platforms (Reddit, Twitter/X, Facebook, LinkedIn) — News Feed Eradicator covers all of these in one extension.

When to choose Unhook:

• You want to keep some YouTube surfaces (e.g., remove the home feed but keep the sidebar for intentional navigation).
• You want to remove Shorts specifically without affecting other pages.

Install News Feed Eradicator — free, Chrome and Firefox.

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uBlock Origin for YouTube control

uBlock Origin has filter lists that can remove YouTube UI elements, but it requires manual configuration. For most users, Unhook is the simpler and more reliable path. Where uBlock Origin adds value for YouTube:

• Ad removal — more comprehensive than YouTube Premium in some configurations.
• Comments removal — toggle off all YouTube comments if you find them a distraction.
• Custom cosmetic filters — for power users who want to remove specific elements not covered by Unhook.

Install uBlock Origin — free, Chrome and Firefox. Requires more configuration effort than Unhook for YouTube-specific control.

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Mobile YouTube: what actually works

Browser extensions don’t run inside the native YouTube iOS or Android app. The app is a sandboxed environment — no extension can intercept its behavior.

Options for mobile YouTube feed control:

Option 1 — Use YouTube in a browser that supports extensions (recommended):

• Android: Kiwi Browser or Yandex Browser (both run Chrome extensions).
• iOS: Orion Browser (runs Chrome extensions).
• Install Unhook inside your Chromium-based mobile browser. Your YouTube feed configuration applies to mobile web YouTube.

Option 2 — Block the YouTube app entirely:

• Opal (iPhone) — blocks the YouTube app at the system level during configured sessions.
• Freedom (iPhone + Mac) — blocks the YouTube app and youtube.com simultaneously.

Option 3 — Use alternative YouTube clients:

• NewPipe (Android, free) — open-source YouTube client with no recommendations, no ads, and no algorithm. Subscribe to channels; see only subscription content.
• YT Music (for music only) — if your YouTube use is primarily music, YouTube Music with a subscription removes ads and recommendations.

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When you need to block YouTube, not just filter it

Feed control tools are for people who use YouTube intentionally but find the recommendation surfaces pulling them off course. If your problem is deeper — you open YouTube compulsively even when you’re trying to stop, you lose hours to the platform despite removing the home feed — that’s a compulsion problem, not a surface problem.

For compulsive YouTube use, add a hard blocker:

• Freedom — blocks youtube.com and the YouTube app across Mac, Windows, iOS, and Android with a cross-device Locked Mode.
• Cold Turkey — blocks youtube.com system-level on Mac and Windows.

Run feed control tools (Unhook + News Feed Eradicator) during your permitted YouTube sessions, and run a hard blocker during your focus hours. They operate at different layers and don’t conflict.

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Recommended setup

For most users:

1. Install Unhook.
2. Toggle off: Home feed, Shorts, Sidebar, End screens, Autoplay.
3. Bookmark youtube.com/feed/subscriptions — your subscription feed, algorithm-free.
4. Done.

For heavy YouTube users who want additional protection:

1. Unhook (feed control during permitted use).
2. Freedom scheduled block during work hours (prevents compulsive opening).
3. Subscriptions only during permitted YouTube time.