YouTube is 1 of the best sites for video content. However, videos can sometimes end up freezing or pausing, and sometimes it'southward difficult to know why.

At that place can besides be the outcome of videos playing for a short time without audio, no matter what yous practise to your volume settings. But how practise you fix it? We've rounded upwardly everything y'all demand to know. Yous tin also check out our guide on how to download YouTube videos.

How to unfreeze YouTube video

Check your broadband

Brand sure it'southward not a slow net connexion causing the problem. If other people in the house are watching Netflix, playing games and doing other things which could exist using up a lot of the bandwidth, this is a quick reply to the trouble.

You can as well use broadband speed checkers such as Speedtest.net to chop-chop notice out how fast your broadband is currently running. You'll want at to the lowest degree a couple of megabits per 2d for a single stream of Hd video, and more than if several people are using the connexion at the same time.

If you take lower speeds and other people need the internet, endeavor dropping the quality of the video you're watching past toggling the wheel icon as seen on the case below. This should be set to 'auto', only you can drop it lower to avoid buffering. Nonetheless, there will be a subtract in the picture quality.

Picture quality

Refresh the YouTube folio or browser

Sometimes, in that location's a unproblematic error in the player, which can be solved past simply refreshing the page you're on, or closing and re-opening the app.

Restart your device

If information technology's not that, attempt restarting your PC, laptop, phone or tablet. This fixes a surprising number of issues, only is oft forgotten in the heat of the moment when you're experiencing a problem. For phones and tablets, agree downward the power button until you run across an option to restart or power off.

Endeavor a different browser or app

Similarly, try watching the YouTube video via a different browser or app, simply in example it's the software causing the issue.

Uninstall Flash

YouTube itself uses HTML5 as the default fashion to play videos, having dropped Wink back in 2015. So it shouldn't be Adobe Wink that'southward causing your trouble. But just to double-bank check that this isn't the example, head to Control Console > Programs and so Uninstall a Program. The list is presented in alphabetical guild, so you should see Adobe Flash player virtually the top if it's installed.

Fix YouTube videos that won't play

Since virtually nothing uses Flash any longer, in that location's no damage in uninstalling it, and y'all'll really protect your PC from its security risks past removing information technology. You can always reinstall it again if y'all demand it for something.

If your YouTube trouble goes away after this, it was near certainly Flash causing the issue.

Firefox and Chrome YouTube tips

If the trouble is persisting, there may be an issue with the browser you're using. Here's some things to endeavor out:

Clear your browser cache

Web pages consistently freezing, slowing or crashing in your browser may be down to the fact that you lot've not cleared your cache out, and it's become full.

To articulate your enshroud, all you need to practise is head into your browser history, select all the files in your history that are cached (you may have to modify the information range), then delete them.

Hither's how to do information technology in both Firefox and Chrome:

  • If using Firefox, click on the three horizontal lines in the top right, select Library > History > Articulate Recent History, change the date range to Everything, then select Clear Now
  • If using Google Chrome, click on the three dots in the top right, select More Tools > Articulate browsing information > Avant-garde, modify the engagement range to All Fourth dimension, brand sure both Cookies and other site data and Cache images and files are selected, then select Articulate Information

Clear browsing data

Disable hardware dispatch

Hardware acceleration is typically automatically turned on in your browser in society to allow programmes to run more efficiently. However, information technology tin also cause some hiccups, including occasionally making YouTube freeze.

To try and solve the effect, y'all can disable hardware dispatch in your browser.

In Firefox click the three horizonal lines at the top right, go to Options > Advanced > General.

In the 2d section called Browsing uncheck Apply Hardware Dispatch when available.

Unchecking this doesn't seem to accept any large bear upon on Firefox or video performance. Similarly, though, if Hardware Acceleration is not ticked, endeavor enabling it.

Information technology'south about identical in Chrome. Click the three dots at the acme right of your browser page, and then choose Settings. Use the search box and type 'hardware', and uncheck Apply hardware acceleration when available.

Hardware acceleration chrome

Disable browser add-ons

If y'all use a lot of extensions in your browser, then some may exist clashing with one another, and consequently causing YouTube to stop working. Hither's how to disable them:

  • In Firefox, click on the 3 horizontal lines in the height right of the page, select Add together-ons, and so choose the extensions and plug-ins you wish to disable
  • In Google Chrome, type chrome://extensions/ into the URL bar and remove the extensions you want

Make sure you and so restart your browser, and attempt YouTube again to see if the problem is fixed.

Check your browser is up to date

Finally the last affair you lot can try is checking for updates in your browser. If you're using an erstwhile version, this can sometimes crusade issues with YouTube. Here'south what you need to exercise:

  • In Firefox, click on the three horizontal lines in the top right of the folio and select About Firefox. The browser should then download whatever updates automatically
  • In Chrome, click the iii dots at the elevation right of the page and select Settings > Near Chrome. The browser should then download whatever updates automatically

Updating browser