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Is YouTube running unusually slowly for you?

Slow YouTube buffering is a common issue which can occur for many reasons. For instance, you can encounter the problem when there’s an issue with your network connection.

Similarly an overloaded server can lead to this problem. A clogged up browser cache is another reason why this issue can arise. In addition to these, there are other potential causes behind this problem.

However, this is something that you can fix fairly quickly so read on for some tips and fixes.

Start with ensuring the issue is not being caused by something on your network. If you are trying to watch YouTube videos in a business organization, keep in mind that you can face this issue if the data allocation for this is limited. Ensure the internet connection is all good and there’s nothing wrong with your connection.

Once you’ve run all the listed checks and find that YouTube buffering speed is as bad as before, we recommend you to try these solutions.

Solution 1 – Change the Video URL

Try replacing www in the URL of the video you wish to watch by ca. You can also use some other URL.

For instance, if you want to open a video with URL https://www.youtube.com/, you can use instead this URL: https://ca.youtube.com/

Solution 2 – Clear Browsing Cache

Browsing cache allows your computer to open websites that you’ve visited before more quickly. While a useful feature, it can at times cause issues, especially when a lot of temporary data accumulates. This can clog and slow down the computer. Clear browsing cache and check whether that helps improve the streaming.

Here are the steps to follow on Chrome.

• Press Ctrl + Shift + Del. This will open the Clear Browsing Data window
• You will see two tabs at the top: Basic and Advanced. Click the latter
• Now select all checkboxes that you see. Finally click on Clear browsing data

Important: If you want, you can exclude the stored passwords, along with browsing data, here. That said, it is best that you clear the cache completely at least once. Now check whether things improve or not.

• End every running application by opening Task Manager (press Ctrl + Alt + Del) and then restart the browser. Check whether YouTube video streaming has improved

Solution 3 – Opt for Lower Quality Settings

The load on the site servers tends to increase at certain hours, known as peak hours. YouTube is no exception. How much traffic a site receives is obviously beyond your control. However, what’s in your control is the video quality settings.

When you change the setting to “Automatically”, the video quality is automatically adjusted as per the internet connection. However, you can change this setting manually if you want. Lowering quality settings have helped some users to fix this issue. We recommend you try it, too.

Here are the steps to follow.

• Open the YouTube video you want to watch
• Click on Gear button (You’ll find it on bottom right hand side)
• 
• Click Quality. Now lower the quality setting
• 

Solution 4 – Check Flash Software

Most web browsers have Adobe Flash Player preinstalled. It is frequently used for embedding videos on a lot of sites. Some users have reported that they were able to fix the YouTube Slow issue by uninstalling Flash Player and then installing the newest version of it from the official Flash site. You can try this solution.

Now by default YouTube switches Firefox users to HTML5 player from Flash Player. If you’re not sure whether your Firefox browser uses HTML5, you check for the same on official YouTube page. That said, several available add-ons on other browsers force Flash when HTML is not working properly.

Check whether the browser you’re using aptly supports HTML5. You should also ensure there are absolutely zero conflicts with installed Adobe software programs. Many users have complained that they cause several issues. Additionally, ensure you’re using the latest Flash version.

Solution 5 – Block 2 IP Address Ranges

When you view a video, typically you watch using Content Delivery Network, or CDN for short. What CDN does is that it helps you view content more easily and quickly by virtually lessening the distance. This, as you may guess, helps improve the performance of a site. It also boosts site rendering.

At times the ISP provider may increase speed between your pc and CDN. This in turn can delay YouTube buffering. This situation may be alleviated if you block 2 IP address ranges. In case the solution doesn’t work, you can use the command listed here to revert the new changes.

Here are the steps to follow to block 2 IP address rangers.

1. Click the Windows icon in the taskbar and then type command prompt in the Start Search box. In the result list, right-click command prompt and then click Run as administrator to open Elevated command prompt
2. Now type this command and then press Enter – netsh advfirewall firewall add rule name=”AppualsTweak” dir=in action=block remoteip=173.194.55.0/24,206.111.0.0/16 enable=yes
3. Exit command prompt window. Check whether YouTube video is streaming better or not
4. In case, the buffering speed is not better than before, undo the changes made by running this command in the elevated command prompt – netsh advfirewall firewall delete rule name=”AppualsTweak”

Solution 6 – Update Graphic Drivers

Outdated drivers can slow down HD streaming. This is exactly what some users have reported. During video streaming, a computer uses the installed Graphic hardware. If the drivers are old, it may not be able to handle the newest optimizations used in YouTube.

You can install drivers via the built-in Device Manager utility or using a fast driver update tool. We will discuss both methods here.

Update Drivers through Device Manager

First you need to boot Windows in the Safe Mode and then delete installed video card drivers. When you reboot Windows, the default drivers will be installed automatically.

You can boot Windows 10 in Safe Mode using the System Configuration tool. You may know it from its filename: msconfig.exe.

Here are the steps to follow to boot Windows in Safe Mode through System Configuration tool.

• Open the search field in taskbar, type system configuration and click system configuration shortcut
• Click the Boot tab in System Configuration window
• Select Safe Boot option in Boot options section
• Click OK
• 
• You will get a pop-up window stating you will have to restart the computer for the changes to take effect. Click the Restart button
• Now Windows will start in Safe Mode directly

Once you’re in Safe Mode, follow these steps to display drivers.

• Press Win + R. This will open the Run dialog box. Type msc and press Enter
• In the device manager window, expand Display adapters. Then right-click the display hardware, and then click Uninstall device
• A pop-up window will appear asking you to confirm the action. Click the OK button
• Now restart Windows in the normal mode
• Go to Device Manager window, select the display hardware and click Update driver
• Now click Search automatically for updated driver software

Windows will automatically conduct a search for newest drivers available. It will then install them.

In case the problem is not solved through updating the device drivers, we recommend you download and install drivers manually by visiting the manufacturer’s site. Once you’ve downloaded the latest driver, follow these steps.

• Open device manager utility
• Expand Display adapters, right-click the hardware device, and click Update driver
• Click Browse my computer for driver software
• Now go to the folder where you stored the downloaded driver file. Select it and let Windows install the driver.
• Reboot Windows and check if the issue is fixed

Update Drivers Automatically

As you can see, updating drivers through Device Manager, besides being technical, is also cumbersome and time-consuming.

Automatic driver update tools offer many benefits, the most important ones being:

• You can update device drivers automatically
• The software scans and updates all outdated or missing drivers at one go
• The tool picks the right drivers for your device and operating system, so you won’t have to worry about installing an incorrect driver by mistake
• Automatic driver updates are 100% safe

Driver Updater is one of the best driver update tools out there. Outbyte Driver Updater will give you access to a database of over 1 million drivers. It will regularly scan your PC, suggesting new driver versions to install. Driver Updater contains drivers for a variety of Windows devices. With just one click, you can update drivers in your system.

Step 1
Click here to Install and launch the app

Step 2
Scan all devices

Step 3
Install or update drivers automatically

 

Start Download

 

Solution 7 – Use a VPN

This is the last step in the list. Try if nothing else has worked till now to resolve YouTube Slow Issue.

Because a VPN bypasses CDN servers, it can help you play YouTube videos more quickly. This solution can work if your CDN servers are overloaded. This can delay video streaming considerably. By skipping the CDN server, a VPN may help load YouTube videos faster.

You can find many paid as well as free VPN services. In case you’ve never used a VPN before, it may be best if you start with a free one. If you found it useful in improving video streaming speed, you can jump to a paid one if needed.

YouTube buffering is not a new issue for Internet users and things have not changed much, either. However, there can be several reasons for the “YouTube is slow” issue.

Some of the reasons could be slow speed of your internet connection, overloading of the portal (youtube.com) or browser issues.

In this post, we have provided some solutions that could fix the YouTube slow speed issue.

Before proceeding to solutions, here are few checks that you need to consider.

Before trying solutions

Firstly you need to check your internet connection is steady and the Internet connection is not slow. On an average, you need 5 to 6 mbps Internet connection speed to watch HD quality videos. Though you might have a 5-6 mbps internet connection, there is no guarantee your computer is receiving all Internet bandwidth.

In many cases, the Internet bandwidth is shared between devices connected to your Wi-Fi network and the average Internet speed that your computer is receiving can be much lower than your actual Internet connection speed.

You need to also check there is not any outage which could create a problem for your internet connection. Once you have confirmed there is no problem with your Internet connection, you can proceed to the solutions given below.

Solution One – Make a small change in the URL

No one knows why this tricks exactly works, but many users have found this trick useful. So you should try it to and see if the slow YouTube issue is resolved. Here are the steps to follow

• Play YouTube video in the browser
• Replace www in the URL with ca

For example – https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mPJCZl6UVM8 to https://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=mPJCZl6UVM8

Solution Two – Change the default video quality setting

There is no way to know the exact reason for YouTube buffering. However, playing the video at a lower resolution might reduce YouTube buffering and you can enjoy stutter free playback experience when watching YouTube videos.

The default video quality setting of YouTube is dynamic and depends on the quality of the Internet connection. It may also change if the quality of the Internet connection improves or degrades. However, a user can change the video quality of any video he/she is watching on YouTube.

If you are experiencing buffering issues while playing a certain YouTube video, you can lower the video quality setting to reduce buffering. Here are the steps to follow.

• Play any YouTube video you want in the browser
• Click the gear icon that appears on the right corner of the player

• Click Quality

• Select any lower video resolution than what appeared in Auto resolution.

Note – In our case, the auto resolution was 240p so we need to select 144p which is the only lower resolution available for the video we played. The highest and lowest video resolution is different for every YouTube video.

• If you have more than one lower quality, select it one after another and see if the video buffering vanishes.

If the steps in this solution did not resolve the slow YouTube issue, move to next solution

Solution Three – Clear Browser Cache and temporary files

When you load a webpage or any YouTube video for the first time, your browser stores it in cache so that it can load the video faster next time. This may work well if you want to repeatedly see the video but not if you want to watch a new video on YouTube

Over time the size of the cache and temporary files grows to big proportion and slows down the browser. If you have not cleared browser cache and temporary files for a long time, it could be the reason behind YouTube being so slow.

Clear the browser cache and temporary files and check whether YouTube speed has improved. Follow these steps to clear browser cache

For Google Chrome

• Launch Chrome
• To access Chrome settings, click the three vertical dots that appear at the right corner of the address bar

• In the dropdown menu, click More tools and then click Clear browsing data

• In the Clear browsing data window, go to the Basic tab
• 
• In Time range, select All time
• Check mark following options – Cookies and other site data and Cached images and files
• Click Clear data

 For Firefox

• Launch Firefox
• To access Firefox settings, click the three horizontal lines that appear at the right corner of the address bar
• In the dropdown menu, click Options

• In the Settings window, click Privacy in the left pane
• click clear your recent history in the right pane

• In the Clear Recent history window, select Everything for Time range to clear
• Check mark following options – Browsing and download history, cache, offline website data
• Click Clear now

Solution Four – Update Flash

This solution is for select Firefox users. If you are using Firefox versions 36, 37, 38, 39, your browser might be using Flash to play YouTube videos.

From Firefox version 40 onwards, HTML5 is the default player for YouTube videos. To update flash player on your computer, visit Adobe website and install the newest version of Flash player.

In Chrome, HTML5 is the default video player for YouTube. If you are using other browsers other than Chrome or Firefox, you need to check if the browser version installed on your computes uses Flash or HTML5 player for YouTube website.

A simple way to check this is right click the YouTube video player in your browser and select Inspect Element from the menu

You will see the code for the page which also mentions player.  Here we have presented result for FireFox browser.

Solution Five – Block CDN IP addresses used by YouTube

Majority of the YouTube content you watch in your browser is delivered by Content Delivery Networks. YouTube uses a CDN network closest to the user location to deliver the content faster and help the user get the best possible experience.

Also, different CDNs server might be storing different cached videos. YouTube buffering might be the result of the CDN server experiencing high traffic.

Some ISP’s limit the connection between you and these CDNs which affect the YouTube loading speed. Blocking the IP addresses of these CDNs can resolve the problem.

When you block CDNs IP addresses your browser/network skips CDS and video actually starts buffering from YouTube server itself. Here are the steps to follow.

• Click Start
• Type cmd in the search bar
• Right-click cmd from the list of results and select Run as administrator
• In the command prompt window, type the command given below hit Enter on the keyboard

• netsh advfirewall firewall add rule name=”YouTubeTweak” dir=in action=block remoteip=173.194.55.0/24,206.111.0.0/16 enable=yes
• Wait for command operation to complete
• Close the command prompt window
• To enable access to CDNs again, open command prompt with administrator rights and type following command in command prompt window and press Enter
• netsh advfirewall firewall delete rule name=”YouTubeTweak”

Open any YouTube video in the browser and see if the speed problem is resolved. If this solution does not resolve slow YouTube issue, move to next solution

Solution Six – Use VPN

Since YouTube content uses loads of data, some ISP’s may be throttling your Internet connection without you knowing it. When you use VPN, all incoming and outgoing traffic is masked by encryption, it would be hard for ISP to know which websites you are visiting and it might not limit your internet connection.

There are several free and paid VPN services. Select a good VPN service and start using it to reduce or eliminate YouTube buffering issues.