YouTube keeps freezing while the audio keeps playing... this is happening on both my Roku TV and PS5, but not my computer..

Same, it's driving me nuts. Get a grip Youtube

just gonna cancel our family premium sub. If they're gonna gimp UX for premium users even though we wouldn't be served ads anyway, may as well just run the ad blocker, have shit UX, but more money.

I'm having the same issue where it's not working on Roku and PS5 but it is working on mobile and laptop

Had the same issue with YouTube Premium on my PS5 for the past 24 hours. Ridiculous!

I've been having the same issue this morning. I watch youtube regularly and have never had it before that I can recall. I came to this forum specifically to see if anyone else was having this issue, and it looks like there are lots of us.

Also I don't pay for premium or use an ad blocker. This is the youtube app on my fire TV.

Also seeing this in Australia. Perfectly fine on my laptop, but completely unusuaable on PS5, still occurring after a reboot too. Seems they've broken something.

I feel like this is a result of YouTube cracking down on ad blockers and premium users getting burned... Cause I don't feel very premium. Maybe a little Red... Anyone? Crickets

Same here. On my iphone everything is ok, but on my xiaomi mi tv stick 4k currently it’s unwatchable. Endless freezing etc.

It's been buffering lots on my Roku TV, Fire Tv, Chromecast and ApplevTV. I dropped the resolution to 480p. It still buffers. I have fiber and all other streaming apps have no problems at full 4k. The problem has been going on for a couple of days. Ipads, iPhone, and computers are all ok though. I wonder, is YouTube aware?

Same here. Paying monthly for this sh*t. And the last month I haven’t been able to even get 1080p in any video. It just freezes and buffers. Netflix and other streaming services I can play 4K without any problems. Started in January after the ad-block update and just getting worse and worse. But yesterday and today can’t even watch a video on my Xbox or PS5 or TV. Ridiculous from a multimillionaire company!

when will YouTube fix this?

I reported a similar problem and received this message. Looks like they're aware and working on it.

Thanks for reaching out to YouTube Support. I see that you're experiencing issues with your YouTube app on the TV.

We’ve received similar reports from other customers, and our Engineering team is currently investigating. We're working to fix the issue as quickly as possible, and will follow up with you as soon as we have an update.

In the meantime, feel free to reply to this email if you have any additional questions or concerns.

Thanks for your patience and understanding!

All the best,

Elle B. The YouTube Team

Started happening on all my firesticks last night but only when signed in to the primary premium account. If using as guest or signed into secondary premium account there is no problem. Go figure.

I too am being plagued by this phenomenon. To add to the confusion, videos I have watched previously are working fine, but any new video is hiccuping. This is only happening in the App. I have reproduced it on a Sony Bravia and a Samsung Odyssey. My phone app (OnePlus 11) and computer are working perfectly fine. (Which is hilarious to me, because those are the devices on which I actually have ad blockers whereas my TVs don't :shrug: ((I'm premium and pay for my YouTube)))

Edit: have been proven wrong. YouTube is just completely borked regardless of video

This is super annoying.

Pretty upset to be having these issues when I pay for premium. They're gonna drive away the customers they actually have by trying to force people into paying for it.

It is happening to me too. All smart TVs and xbox are having the issue but I can watch videos just fine on my phone. I did all troubleshoot you could think of to where it has to be Youtube itself. They better fix it soon 😩

YouTube keeps freezing on my ps5, so annoying lol

This has been happening to me since last night (approx 12hours ago) on my Fire TV, but not my iPhone. It weirdly only occurs on my account, but not my husband’s. Hopefully they resolve this issue, if they’re already aware of it.

Non premium user will not work when signed into account but guest works, just doesn’t save progress or history. I get ads on my regular account so I don’t think it’s an ad conspiracy haha

I cast from my phone (official YouTube app, no premium) to my Chromecast and have been facing the same issues for the past day. I’ll get like ten seconds into a video, my screen still turn black and it’ll say loading, it’ll play like normal, then 30 seconds in it just freezes, says loading, and no matter how long I leave it it will not resume. Isn’t an internet issue because the video plays fine playing directly on my phone on the exact same wifi.

YT app on TV hangs up video and only plays audio. I’ve reset TV, deleted app, cleared cache, etc still does it on all TV’s in my house… (Amazon fireTV, insignia FireTV, Samsung smart TV)

Gotta be a bug. Hopefully it’s picked up and fixed soon!

Until I realized it was all TV’s I almost ripped my outdoor patio TV off the wall!!! 😅

I thought I was crazy, just started yesterday.

Getting the same issue as well since yesterday. Works fine on my phone but on my Sony android TV it doesn't work.

Same issue here on my Sony TV. Still works in my browser on my PC with no issues.

This started about 2 days ago for me on the 13th of June. I tried all the basic trouble shooting including wired vs. wireless connection on the TV. Factory resetting the TV and unplugging it over night. All the other streaming apps work fine, no issues there. I even tried uninstalling the updates to the app before I factory reset the TV.

I can't tell if it's a bug in the app or what.

Same issue on Sony Smart TV. Reset app, cleared cache, unplugged TV. Using Ethernet so it's not Wi-Fi issue. Speed test said it's good. Netflix works fine. Tried using Xbox, same results.

Same issue here - buffering, scales down quality, then eventually freezes but audio continues within a couple minutes. Works in 360p but trash to watch.

Current work around is signing out and connecting via iphone then playing from iphone app. Contacted support and theyre aware of the issue. No ETA of when it’ll be fixed.

Whats odd is that my lady’s account works just fine.

Happening on my Sony Bravia YouTube app

It's crazy if you switch to Guest account it works fine with 100 ads. Literally spit in our face for paying for premium YouTube. I thought y'all were bullshittin with the Guest account thing but no it works perfectly with 100 ads a minute. 2 days now and YouTube acts like they don't know anything.

Have something to add, maybe others could test. I have YouTube Premium and it doesn't work on my Roku TV, really at all anymore (been getting progressively worse for a few weeks, starting with 1hr 4k HDR videos.).

What DOES fix it is signing out of my account (I have YouTube Premium). Appears to be an account level issue, very disappointing. No streaming issues on the same videos if I am signed out, but once I sign back in with YouTube Premium it breaks.

I have found a temporary fix. (For PS5) I've read this from another commenter so credits to him(forgot username).

log in on youtube app as guest. Connect with your phone, and select videos through your phone.

Same thing has been happening on my samsung tv the last day or so. It is fine on my phone. Really stupid.

I am having the same issue currently!!

Also a premium subscriber. On PS4 the app is doing as you described, picture freezing but audio continues. On my Roku and Flexbox it will just freeze all together until I restart the video.

I'm really paying for the premium experience!

Same happening here in YouTube on a Sony Bravia but my mobile works just fine. Wtf?

Started for me too since last night (about 24 hours ago) Even factory reset my entire tv before I saw this post.

Glad I’m not the only one. I just recently let my subscription to Premium lapse and half wondered if they were quietly throttling non Premium watchers. I can get maybe 20 seconds of uninterrupted footage to play at 480p before it starts hitching. 1440p60 or above plays for maybe two seconds before hitching.

Surely it has to be an app error.. right?

Same for me, Sony bravia TV

Phone youtube works fine

All other streaming services on the TV work fine

It surely is YT messing something up

PS5 app is useless right now

freezing image

and if you increase playback speed, it forces 480p quality

youtube gotta fix this

Same issue here - YouTube Premium on a Sony Bravia Android TV and videos are hanging while the audio continues. This is frustrating. I’ll use a guest account for now but I’m paying for the service for a reason; to avoid ads and get better quality video options.

It's been happening to me too for the last few days idk y

Good to know I'm not the only one.  Started freezing last night, switched accounts to a non premium account and didn't have any issues.  Have been able to screen cast it from the phone problem free as well. 

This is shit… if you set quality to 480 it works but anything above that is unusable.. fuck YouTube! Edit: scratch that even on low setting no change.

same

Not working for me on PS5 either... 

Same here on my amazon fire stick and not a premium user. A suggestion I saw was to use the guest account—I did and it’s working fine. Not sure why our user accounts are bugging and not the guest account but until they fix it it’s a nice temporary solution.

Yea same here

also happening here too, since yesterday. tried casting to tv, tried using smart TV app, tried ps5. I pay premium, have gigabit fibre in nz. was thinking it was just caching but nope, reset app, deleted and reinstalled and same thing kept happening. guest account works?? ads work to a degree, but people pay not to watch ads, which yeah, makes u think they are cracking down more on adblockers.

This only started happening on my ps5 after the latest software update. Pretty damn annoying

The stupidest thing with this is that the ads are not affected. On the ps5, on trying to load a video, a 55 second ad ran in 1080p without any buffering, but as soon as a video loads, buffering at the 8-9 second mark. Tried on multiple videos, same issue.

Same here. All day. Mobile, Xbox, Nvidia shield, LG TV. None work. I should mention I have Gigabit Internet too, no other media apps are affected.

Change ur settings to 360p. It’s low quality but it’s not skipping for me right now

Same - Google TV and xsx. 

I’m having the same experience.

None of the other streaming apps are doing this, only YouTube.

On PS5. Just restarted and still happening.

I’m like 90% sure they are having issues on their end.

Having the same issue on my phone and shield for last few hours.

Having the same issue on ps5

same on my sony android tv

I have the same issue, thought it was just a connection issue with youtube, maybe servers on fire, so I watched a whole ass movie. Come back 2.5 hours later and the issue persists

but I'm on my computer, and my connection to everything else is flawless. No amount of browser changing, restarting, extension removing, or refreshing does anything at all.

this is happening on my laptop, but not my phone (which doesn't have adblock coincidentally).

Yep, I'm in Portugal and it's just like that on Google TV and Vivaa, fine on the PCs

I am facing the same problem too, contacted google support they told me to report the app

I am having some variation of this on an Nvidia Shield, a Roku HD, and a Aurzen (Chinese) all-in-one projector.

My iPhone is unaffected, as is my Laptop.

Seems Google has broken something interesting.

Not currently happening on my roku ultra box - premium. Only issue - thats been going on for a week or so - it that sometimes when I replay a section, when it gets back to about where I reversed it hangs and I have to exit and return.

Same here, on all devices. I’m a premium payer, but if I sign out the freezing stops.

Yep. Same here. Happened last night and was still the same this morning. Only appears to be an issue on my Fire TV 4K Max, where I've restarted the device twice, cleared data and cache.

My 2022 LG TV App seems okay as does my phone.

(I'm on Premium)

Same here. Roku Ultra. One account is unplayable, another works fine. I got on YT support chat and they say "we have had similar complaints from other customers ... we are working on it." I suggest we inundate the support chat with complaints - hopefully they can or will fix this.

It’s happening on my ps5 audio is coming but video gets frozen . I have YouTube premium what are they even trying to do now.

Yes - premium customer here and it started happening this morning. Completely broken and videos unwatchable. I’ll give it 48 hours and then cancel if they don’t fix it.

Literally only doing this on my premium profile. When I switch to guest, everything works without a hitch. This is gonna piss off a lot of premium users.

Started last night for me. On my mobile it works but nothing on my ps5 plays. The full audio plays but my video freezes Amos t instantly

Same issue on LG OS TV, video loads, plays about 30s of video and then hangs on buffering. I have rebooted everything in the chain, uninstalled/reinstalled, and tested two different connections (one fibre and one VDSL), issue persists.

TL;DR, It’s a them thing - All you can do for now is wait it out.

Having the same issue youtube app on my phone works fine but PS5 youtube freezes video but audio continues to play. Its so annoying

ps5 YouTube is freezing for me but the sound still plays hoping YouTube fix this asap

Same here on all our Sony Bravia with Google TV… you would say a preferred platform for YouTube. But it seems to be starting with AV1 video, then it falls back to VP9 and then AVC1.

In the last mode it seems to be playing longer, as the bitrate is lower.

Videos that are not uploaded with AV1 enabled, seem to be playing ok with VP9 codec.

Also, I have YT Premium and not using Adblock on my network…

Happening on switch too.

Happens to me using Google TV quite a bit. It's irritating

Same here. Yt app on Xbox one.

sign out or use quest

Happening here on my gcctv 4k. Buffering, freezing, ultra low quality streaming onnlla 1GB up and down fiber. Aaaand I'm premium...

Same here. Only on PS5.

I’ve been having the same problem today. I got up this morning and upgraded my PS5 M2 storage and when I tried to watch YouTube videos, the picture started freezing, but the sound kept playing, so I thought something was wrong with the memory that I just added. After trying all kinds of different things to resolve the issue, I discover that the issue is really with the YouTube app and not my console nor the attachments to it. About two hours wasted.

It's their shitty app. If I try watching youtube on the app, it will freeze just as you describe. If I change resolution it will unfreeze for about 20 secs before freezing again. If I watch through the browser, no issues. This is on PS4. If your Roku has a browser, use that.

Same as me since last night

Same, Nvidia shield 2015. Started last night. I watch sooo much YouTube. It's so annoying Im thinking about going outside. 🤭

Just switch accounts:p

Yup. Started this morning for me. I tried everything, but nothing works. Clearly a YouTube side thing. On my phone it works fine. On my PS5, it's unwatchable. The video just stops constantly.

Same thing happening to me on my premium account. Switched to guest profile and it's working fine.

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Y’all go clear search history under settings and see if that works I think it just worked for me

I'm so glad it's not just me... I tried everything, I was about to go crazy. When tf are they gonna fix this 🙄

I experience the same on my NVIDIA Shield Pro since this morning. Yesterday evening it was fine. Tried downgrading YouTube to the build in version without any changes. Could it be Android TV got an update?

Same on PS5. Just start happening this morning.

This has just started happening on my Google Chromecast TV 4K - the android TV app on my Phillips TV works fine though, so does my phone. It's SUPER annoying. Has Google said anything about this, I can't find any info - I'm a premium member as well.

Premium subscriber, experiencing this issue for ~24 hours Spent half of my weekend resetting my FireTV, thought “Fuck Amazon”, wiped the dust off my PS4, launched Youtube there, only to experience the same issue So “fuck Google” I guess

Really fucking annoying. Of course the ads work just fine, but videos break almost immediately.

It's happening to my boyfriend, he has premium and videos freeze but you can hear sound. I have basic YouTube and it doesn't freeze.

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Switching to guest mode helps.