YouTube without the algorithm: how to follow channels chronologically

The short version

• Around 70 % of watch time on YouTube comes from recommendations (YouTube, 2018); 71 % of regretted videos were recommended (Mozilla, 2021).
• With built-in tools: the subscriptions feed instead of the home page, pause watch history, turn off autoplay.
• Cleaner but fiddly: every channel has a public RSS feed for feed readers.
• An app with its own inbox shows only your channels' videos, chronologically and without suggestions. Why zentr is built this way.

of YouTube watch time comes from recommendations (YouTube, 2018)

~70%

of videos people regretted watching were recommended (Mozilla, 2021)

71%

How much the algorithm steers

In 2018, YouTube's then chief product officer Neal Mohan said around 70 percent of watch time on YouTube comes from recommendations. The goal, he said, was something like a personalized, synthetic channel for every viewer. There's no newer official figure, but the direction has only intensified: the home feed, autoplay and Shorts are more personalized than ever.

Recommendations are fine as such – sometimes that's how you find great channels. The problem is their goal: they're optimized for as much watch time as possible, and much isn't the same as good. In 2021 the Mozilla Foundation asked more than 37,000 volunteers which videos they regretted watching. 71 percent of those had been recommended by YouTube, and recommended videos were 40 percent more likely to be regretted than ones people searched for.

What the EU says

Under the Digital Services Act (DSA), very large platforms like YouTube must offer EU users at least one recommendation option that is not based on profiling (Art. 38 DSA). In March 2026 the digital rights network EDRi filed a complaint alleging that YouTube's option is hard to find. Nothing has been decided yet – but the debate shows that “without the algorithm” has become a political topic too.

5 ways to use YouTube without the recommendation spiral

1. Open the Subscriptions feed instead of Home

Under “Subscriptions”, YouTube lists videos from the channels you subscribe to in chronological order. It's the easiest step. The catch: the app still opens on the personalized home feed, and Shorts sneak in.

2. Pause your watch history

Since 2023, if you turn off watch history and have no significant history, the home feed shows only search and subscriptions. The downside: handy features like “continue watching” suffer too.

3. Turn off autoplay

The little switch in the player decides whether the next video starts on its own. Off is off – that alone prevents a lot of “just one more” evenings.

4. Follow channels via RSS

Little known: every YouTube channel has a public RSS feed at youtube.com/feeds/videos.xml?channel_id=…, a subscribable list of its latest videos, so you can follow channels in any feed reader. It's very clean, but fiddly, and videos end up separate from your podcasts and music.

5. Use an app with its own inbox

That's the approach we took with zentr: you follow the channels you care about, and new videos land in the same inbox as new podcast episodes, audio dramas and albums – newest at the top. Instead of a home feed and suggestions you see only what your channels published; Shorts are hidden by default. A filter shows only the videos when you want.

Why zentr deliberately has no algorithm

When we planned zentr, the obvious question was whether to put recommendations in the inbox. We decided against it, for three reasons.

• You know best what you want. Your favorites are already a very good selection. An algorithm would mostly push other things in between.
• Complete, not curated. With an algorithmically ranked feed you never know what's missing. In the inbox you see everything your channels published – and at some point you're done.
• No profile. Recommendations need a profile of your behavior. zentr doesn't build one: its usage statistics are anonymous and can be turned off, and your library lives on your device and in your iCloud.

Under the hood zentr uses YouTube's official interfaces and channel feeds. Playback goes through YouTube itself: you choose whether a video opens in the YouTube app or plays in YouTube's official player right inside zentr. In zentr's player you get the original audio track instead of an AI dub, and if you swipe the mini video past the edge, you only hear the sound. In zentr's player you get the original audio track instead of an AI dub, and if you swipe the mini video past the edge, you only hear the sound. YouTube stays YouTube; zentr makes sure you go in with intent and come back out again. If you want to browse, Find has charts and a curated selection, kept apart from the inbox. If you want to browse, Find has charts and a curated selection, kept apart from the inbox.

How to hear podcasts from YouTube and your podcast app in one place again is covered in Podcasts on YouTube and in your podcast app.