YouTube, have you ever heard the saying, “If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it?” Why, of all the things that need to change on your platform, are you messing with your website’s UI? The video player is now squeezed to the top left corner, with a bloated suggested video feed below it, while descriptions and reviews are squeezed to the right third of the page. It conveys "Graphic design is my passion".
No one is happy about this change, but YouTube doesn't seem to care. Unlike other types of changes rolled out to the site, the new layout looks to be mostly permanent. There is no option to revert to the old look, or opt out of the experimental design. If you open YouTube and see the new user interface, you're in trouble. (That said, one Reddit user claimed their layout restored itself after four weeks.)
While YouTube seems willing to make this change a regular habit for more and more users, those users won't give in without a fight. Of course, the internet doesn't like being told what to do and has found ways around these forced changes.
In a post on r/YouTube last month, Redditor Chaski1212 shared a workaround: Chaski1212 wrote a piece of code that reverts all YouTube changes to the old UI, and it seems to work. While I don't have the new layout on any of my Google accounts yet, a lot of Reddit users have shared that the code restored the old layout on their accounts, so it seems like a solid solution for now.
How to restore the old YouTube layout
First, you need to install uBlock Origin in your browser. This is an extension that blocks many different elements on web pages (i.e. ads) while you browse. However, you can set filters in uBlock Origin for advanced adjustments. This is where Chaski1212's code comes into play.
After installing uBlock Origin in your browser (it works on Chrome, Firefox, Microsoft Edge, and Opera), open the extension and click on the three gears to open the dashboard. Here, click My Filters and paste the following:
! Youtube new UI fix youtube.com###related#thumbnail.ytd-rich-grid-media:style(margin-right: 8px!important;height: 94px!important;width: 168px!important;min-width: 168px! Important ;) youtube.com ###related #avatar-link.ytd-rich-grid-media, #related #attached-survey.ytd-rich-grid-media, #related.ytd-rich-shelf-renderer .button -container.ytd-rich-shelf-renderer:style(display:none!important;) youtube.com###related#dismissible.ytd-rich-grid-media:style(display:flex;flex-direction:row! important ;) youtube.com###related#details.ytd-rich-grid-media:style(width: 100%!important; min-width: 0!important;) youtube.com###related#contents ytd- rich -item-renderer:style(margin:0!important;margin-top:8px!important;) youtube.com###relatedytd-rich-grid-row #contents.ytd-rich-grid-row,#relatedh3 .ytd-rich-grid-media, #relatedytd-rich-section-renderer #content, #related #rich-shelf-header.ytd-rich-shelf-renderer:style(margin:0!important;) youtube. com###Related ytd-rich-item-renderer.ytd-rich-grid-row,#content.ytd-rich-item-renderer:style(width:100%!important;) youtube.com###Related# video-title.ytd-rich-grid-media:style(font-size:1.4rem!important;) youtube.com###related.ytd-channel-namea,#related#metadata-line.ytd-video- Yuan block span:style(font-size:12px!important;) youtube.com###Related ytd-rich-grid-renderer #contents:style(padding-top:0px!important;) youtube.com###Related .ytd-rich-shelf-renderer ytd-rich-item-renderer.ytd-rich-shelf-renderer:style(width:130px!important;min-width: 130px!important;) youtube.com###related# content .ytd-rich-shelf-renderer:style(display: flex !important;flex-direction: row !important;gap: 8px !important;flex-wrap: nowrap!important;max-width: 400px!important;overflow- x : scroll!important;overflow-y: hide!important) youtube.com###related.ytd-rich-shelf-renderer .yt-core-image:style(object-fit: cover!important;) youtube.com # ##Related ytd-rich-section-renderer #contents:style(margin-left:0!important) youtube.com###Related #contents ytd-rich-section-renderer ytd-rich-item-renderer:style( margin -top:0px!Important;) youtube.com###related.ytd-rich-shelf-renderer ytd-rich-item-renderer.ytd-rich-shelf-renderer[hidden=""]:style(display:block ! Important ;) youtube.com###Related #dismissible.ytd-rich-shelf-renderer: style(margin: 0! Important; border-color: transparent! Important) youtube.com###title yt-formatted-string. ytd-watch-metadata: style (font-size: 20px! important; font-weight: 700! important; line-height: 28px! important) youtube.com##+js(settings, yt.config_.EXPERIMENT_FLAGS.kevlar_watch_grid, false) youtube .com##+js(setting, yt.config_.EXPERIMENT_FLAGS.small_avatars_for_comments, false) youtube.com##+js (setting, yt.config_.EXPERIMENT_FLAGS.kevlar_watch_comments_panel_button, false) youtube.com##+js(setting, yt .config_.EXPERIMENT_FLAGS.web_rounded_thumbnails, false) youtube.com##+js(setting, yt.config_.EXPERIMENT_FLAGS.web_watch_rounded_player_large, false) youtube.com##+js(setting, yt.config_.EXPERIMENT_FLAGS.kevlar_watch_max_player_width, 1280)
This mess of code should tell uBlock Origin to fix almost any problem with the YouTube player. If I see my YouTube UI change, I'll grab this code right away. Let's just hope YouTube doesn't find a way around this hack, or better yet, ditch this redesign altogether.
