Recommendations and Watch History

To change what YouTube recommends, click More (the three dots) beside a video on Home or under the player and choose Not interested, or Don't recommend channel to drop a whole channel (YouTube Help). Recommendations are built from your watch history, search history, likes and dislikes, Google Account activity and that feedback, so deleting or pausing watch history at myactivity.google.com resets the biggest input. Turn history off with nothing recent in it, and YouTube removes the recommendations on Home altogether, until history is turned back on.

Quick facts

From Manage your recommendations & search results and View, delete, or turn on or off watch history, read Nov 6, 2026.

How do I tell YouTube I'm not interested?

1. On Home or beside the video you are watching, click or tap More next to the video, playlist, post or shelf.
2. Choose Not interested.
3. For a video, choose Tell us why to add "I've already watched the video" or "I don't like the video".

On a smart TV, streaming device or console, press and hold the select button on the remote and choose Not interested; there, "Don't recommend channel" is one of the reasons offered (Help).

How do I stop YouTube recommending a channel?

Click More beside any of the channel's videos, Shorts or posts on Home or the watch page and choose Don't recommend channel, or Don't recommend posts from channel for its posts alone. The channel can still be found by searching, and you can still subscribe; it just stops being suggested. For Shorts in general, tap More at the top of a Shorts grid on Home and choose Show fewer Shorts (Help; YouTube Shorts).

Undoing feedback

1:36 All "Not interested" and "Don't recommend channel" feedback is stored in your Google Account. To clear it, go to myactivity.google.com, choose Other Google activity, find YouTube 'Not interested' feedback and click Delete. "Show fewer Shorts" is cleared the same way, under its own heading (Help). Clearing feedback brings back channels you hid.

How do I pause or delete my watch history?

• See it: myactivity.google.com > YouTube History > Manage history, where a search box finds old views.
• Delete one video: click the X beside it.
• Delete a range: click Delete and pick the period; this also deletes your YouTube searches in that period.
• Pause it: on the YouTube history page in My Activity, open the Controls tab and choose Turn off. Videos watched while it is off are not recorded.
• Auto-delete: Manage history > Auto-delete, choose how long to keep it, Next, Confirm.
• Signed out: on youtube.com choose History, then Pause watch history or Clear all watch history.
• TV or console: Settings > Pause watch history or Clear watch history.

0:40 After deleting, YouTube stops basing recommendations on what was removed, and deleting it all starts recommendations fresh (View, delete, or turn on or off watch history). In the app the same page opens from You, the gear, then Manage all history, where Trevor Nace chose Delete and Delete all time to reset his recommendations.

What happens with watch history off

Pausing history stops it shaping recommendations and search. Help adds that when you have no relevant or significant recent watch history and have said you do not want recommendations based on it, features such as recommendations on the YouTube homepage are removed (Help). The result is a Home page without recommended videos, while subscriptions, search and the rest of YouTube still work. Some people choose that on purpose to stop the feed pulling them in. Pausing history for a while is also Help's suggestion for researching a subject without it taking over your recommendations; turn it back on afterward (Help).

How recommendations work

YouTube's recommendations are tuned to watch history, search history, likes and dislikes, Google Account activity and feedback (Help). In a Sep 15, 2021 explainer, YouTube's VP of Engineering, Cristos Goodrow, wrote that clicks alone proved a poor guide, so watch time was added in 2012, followed by surveys in which only videos rated four or five stars count as "valued watchtime", plus shares, likes and dislikes (YouTube blog). Creators read that as a reason to make videos people are glad they watched, not only videos people click (Growing a Channel).

What creators say

2:15 In a Sep 30, 2024 video on resetting recommendations, Trevor Nace advised going beyond watch history: review your liked videos and unlike the ones you no longer want more of, delete comments, and unsubscribe from channels you have lost interest in, since likes, comments, subscriptions and search history all feed what YouTube suggests. That is his advice from experience; YouTube Help lists likes and dislikes, searches and feedback among the signals.

Frequently asked questions

How do I reset my YouTube recommendations? Delete your watch and search history at myactivity.google.com and clear your "Not interested" feedback; YouTube then starts recommendations fresh.

Why is my YouTube home page empty? YouTube removes Home recommendations when watch history is turned off and there is no significant recent history; turn watch history back on to get them back.

Does pausing watch history on YouTube delete it? No. Pausing stops new videos being recorded; what is already there stays until you delete it.

How do I undo "Don't recommend channel" on YouTube? Go to myactivity.google.com, choose Other Google activity, then YouTube 'Not interested' feedback, and delete it; this clears all such feedback at once.

Does deleting YouTube watch history also delete searches? Deleting a range of watch history with Delete in My Activity also deletes your YouTube search history for that range.

Sources

• Manage your recommendations & search results, YouTube Help, read Nov 6, 2026
• View, delete, or turn on or off watch history, YouTube Help, read Nov 6, 2026
• On YouTube's recommendation system, YouTube Official Blog, Sep 15, 2021
• How To Reset YouTube Recommendations, Trevor Nace, Sep 30, 2024 (video)