By Kavita Mistry 
YouTube is the go-to place for millions across the globe for viewing content. You can listen to music, watch movies, skits, comedy shows, clips, tutorials, reviews, documentaries, and everything in between. YouTube also has Shorts — a short video format, where creators share something interesting in under three minutes. In short, there is no shortage of content on YouTube. But there can be a huge difference between what you like to watch and what the app recommends.
YouTube understands your watching habits — the videos you watch, the genre that you prefer, the videos you like and comment on, etc., and feeds that to the algorithm to recommend you videos on the first page. However, most of the time, the recommendations are a total mess and are random. In this guide, we will share with you some effective ways to fix YouTube recommendations. Let’s get right into it.
5 Ways to fix YouTube recommendations
You can apply the solution mentioned in this guide to any of your devices, be it your phone, TV, tablet, or even a laptop, basically on anything on which you use YouTube.
Pause your Watch History
Whenever you hop onto YouTube to watch a video, your watch history gets recorded. This means that everything that you click will influence the recommendations that the YouTube algorithm suggests. And once you stop watching history, the algorithm doesn’t get fresh data. This means that if you have watched a one-off video, let’s say for a project or tutorial, YouTube will not recommend you videos from that category if you have your Watch History paused. Here’s how you can do it:
On mobile
- Launch the YouTube app.
- Tap on the You tab at the bottom.
- Choose View all under History.
- Tap the three-dot menu icon, select Clear all watch history, and then tap the Pause watch history option.
On a desktop browser
- Visit the YouTube website.
- Click on the You tab in the sidebar.
- Click View all beside History.
- Choose Clear all watch history and Pause watch history.
You can continue watching content as per your wish, and the YouTube algorithm will not pick that data and mess with your recommendations. Once you are done binge-watching something that you are watching for one time, then you can turn on Watch History to get the correct recommendations.
Turn off autoplay
YouTube has a feature called autoplay that automatically plays the video after a video ends. While most of the time a related video is played, it may not be from the creator you like. What this does is make YouTube believe that you have watched that video and are interested in it. Which eventually messes up your recommendations. Here’s how you can turn off autoplay and fix YouTube recommendations.
On mobile
- Launch the YouTube app.
- Tap on your profile picture.
- Tap on the gear icon in the top-right corner to open Settings.
- Select Playback.
- Toggle off the Autoplay next video option.
On a desktop browser
- Visit the YouTube website.
- Play a video.
- Toggle off the Autoplay switch.
Manually train the YouTube algorithm
Despite performing the above steps, your YouTube feed might remain messed up. In such a case, you need to manually train the YouTube algorithm by ensuring that random channels aren’t recommended. For that, you can make use of YouTube’s Not interested and Don’t recommend channel options.
If you see a random video that is out of your interest, simply tap on the three-dot menu icon and select Not interested. This removes that specific video from your feed, preventing you from accidentally opening it and training the YouTube algorithm.
There is also a Don’t recommend channel option that you can use that stops viewing content from that particular channel altogether. Since you cannot select multiple videos and apply these options, you need to perform this every time for every video. But that’s how you train the algorithm to show you correct videos in your feed.
Create a secondary account
If you are a person who loves exploring new genres but doesn’t want to mess up your recommendations, then the safest bet is to create a secondary YouTube account. What this will do is give you the freedom to explore content, and secondly, it keeps the recommendations on the main account focused.
To switch accounts:
- Tap on your profile picture at the bottom.
- Tap on the Switch account button.
- Select the secondary account.
When you want to watch content that interests you, you can switch to the main account. And when you are in the mood for exploring, then you can switch over to the secondary account. Another option is to go incognito, as it will help keep your subscriptions and watch history separated.
Play videos from your subscriptions
If you want to keep your recommendations tidy, then one of the best ways is to keep watching videos from the Subscription tab. This will only show videos uploaded by the channels you have subscribed to, ensuring that you feed shows their content.
Tap on the Subscription tab on the bottom bar and start watching videos from the content creators you like. It is one of the most effective ways to improve YouTube recommendations.