YouTube Not Working? Here Is How to Fix It

Sep. 25, 2019

YouTube is the largestvideo-sharing platformin the world with a huge audience and support for long lists of devices. However, despite its immense popularity, users face a range of issues at times. From black screen to constant buffering to playback error, there are lots of problems YouTube needs to address. Nevertheless, if YouTube is not working on your device then there is no reason to worry. In this article, we have come up with 15 different methods to fix many of its nagging issues. With that said, let’s begin the article without any delay.

In this section, we have mentioned 15 ways to deal with a multitude of YouTube issues. The steps are quite straightforward and you can easily resolve them on your own. Apart from that, we have also explained many steps to give you a better idea of the problems and their fixes. Now without further ado, let’s find the desired solution for you.

Before looking for solutions, check if YouTube is down in your region. Of late, YouTube and many other online platforms havefaced outages globally due to high-volume network congestion. So, if YouTube is not working all of a sudden then it’s likely down for everyone. You can find the real-time status of YouTube fromhereandhere.

Sometimes, expired cookies or clogged app data don’t allow YouTube to function properly. In such cases, you need to clear cache data and cookies. Here is how to do it.

1. On the desktop, pastechrome://settings/clearBrowserDatain the Chrome URL bar and hit enter. After that, select cache and cookies and then change the Time Range to “All time”. Finally, click on the “Clear data” button.

2. On Android, tap and hold the YouTube app and open “App Info”. Here, go to Storage and thenclear both data and cache.

3.On iOS, you can’t clear the cache manually, but you can delete the app and re-install it again to start afresh without any issues.

If YouTube is not working on your computer, there is a high chance that someChrome extensionsare blocking access. To find whether extensions are the main culprit, follow these steps.

1. Open Chrome andpress “Ctrl + Shift + N” shortcut key(Cmd+Shift+N for Mac)at once and an incognito window will open up. Now, open YouTube and see if it’s working. If so, then some dubious extensions are certainly creating trouble.

2. To remove such extensions, pastechrome://extensions/in the URL bar and hit enter. Here, go through all the extensions and uninstall the ones you have no idea about.Also, try to disable as many extensions as possible to determine the culprit extension.

It might be that you are using an old version of Chrome or YouTube app which is not fully compatible with the latest build. In such cases, updating the app fixes most of the issues.

1. On the desktop, open Chrome and pastechrome://settings/helpin the address bar. Here, check for the latest update and install it right away.

2.On Android and iOS,open your respective app store and update the YouTube app. It should hopefully fix the problem you are facing.

2. Similarly, pastechrome://settings/content/soundin the address bar and enable the toggle for sound settings. It will allow YouTube to play sound.

Sometimes, even after you have removed shady extensions, some changes remain in effect unless you reverse them manually. The proxy setting is one of them which extensions modify and that results in unreachable websites. Here is how to restore the proxy settings on your desktop.

1. Pastechrome://settings/systemin the address bar and hit enter. Here, click on “Disable” under the proxy settings section. Now, open YouTube and check if it’s working.

If you are facing black or green screen issues while playing YouTube videos then in all probability, it’s the outdated graphics driver that is causing the problem. Here’s how to fix it.

1. On Windows PC, press “Windows” and “R” keys at once and a small Run window will open up. Here, typedevmgmt.mscand hit enter.

2. A Device Manager window will show up. Now,double-click on “Display Adapters”and it will expand. Here, right-click on each sub-menu and click on “Update Driver”.

3. Finally,click on “Search automatically… “and it will start looking for the latest Graphics driver from the internet. So keep your PC connected to the internet. After that, restart your computer, and this time YouTube should work without any issues.

Hardware acceleration is a great feature to play YouTube at the best quality. However,if your machine is old then disabling it will be a better option. It allows you to play YouTube at decent performance without any stutter or throttling.

However, if you have a powerful computer then do enable hardware acceleration. Openchrome://settings/systemin Chrome and you will find the dedicated settings.

Many a time, due to incorrect timezone, date, or region set on the device, YouTube does not work and keeps showing the loading sign. So the fix is simple, just sync the time with the correct values and you will have YouTube working again.Open the Settings page of your device and look for time-related menu. Now, makes changes and restart your device, and hopefully this time YouTube works without any issues.

Besides Chrome extensions, there can be rogue applications installed on your PC which can create trouble against the proper functioning of YouTube. The best way to deal with this problem is to remove unknown apps.

1. On Windows PC, open the Run window by pressing the Windows and R keys at once. Here,type “appwiz.cpl” and hit enter.

2. After that, find apps which you don’t use often and uninstall them right away.

3. You can also find harmful apps through Chrome.Paste chrome://settings/cleanupin the address bar and click on the “Find” button. You can uninstall the apps thereafter.

4. Open the Run window again andtype “cmd”and hit enter.

5. Here,type ipconfig /flushdnsand hit Enter. The DNS will be restored to the default settings.

On macOS, navigate toApplications → Utilities → Terminaland paste the following command, and hit enter. It will ask for your Mac login password, enter it and the DNS cache will be flushed successfully.

If YouTube is not working on your Android or iOS device thenyou can try enabling the airplane mode. After a while, turn off the airplane mode and check if YouTube is working. If not, then you can reset the network settings altogether.

1.On Android, open the Settings page and navigate to System -> Reset Options -> Reset WiFi, Mobile, and Bluetooth. Finally, tap on the “Reset Settings” button.

2.On iOS, go to Settings -> General -> Reset and tap on “Reset Network Settings” at the bottom. Now, restart your smartphone and check if YouTube is working or not.

It may seem unlikely but OS updates can fix most of the issues on devices.Device makers regularly push cumulative updates which are targeted to quell various types of bugs. Besides, your device also gets refreshed during the process with fresh installation and security patches.  So, if you have a pending update on your smartphone or PC, go ahead and update it right now. It might resolve the YouTube issues you are facing on your device.

If YouTube is not working in your school or college then it’s very likely that the website has been restricted by the authority. In such cases,a VPN can help you access YouTube by tunneling the network to a different country.Also, if you live in a country where YouTube is blocked then VPN can help you evade the geographical restriction. You can find thebest free VPN servicesfrom our list here.

If none of the methods worked then your ISP may be at fault. ISPs are responsible for providing internet access, but they can also block access to certain websites from their end. So to resolve the YouTube issue, you shouldcontact your ISP and ask them to lift the restriction.

Follow These Easy Steps to Fix Any YouTube Issues

So that was our article on how to resolve issues if YouTube is not working properly. We have included a range of issues from basic to advanced so that you find the desired solution to your problem. No matter if YouTube keeps buffering or shows a black screen, we have mentioned various steps to resolve the issues. Anyway, that is all from us. If we helped you fix the problem, do let us know in the comment section below.

Passionate about Windows, ChromeOS, Android, security and privacy issues. Have a penchant to solve everyday computing problems.