More than once users have reached out to us to help them with “YouTube not working issue on chrome”.

Given that this issue is common—as well as easily resolvable—we’ve decided to dedicate a full post to it.

What happens is that when you try to play some YouTube video on chrome, the video doesn’t load and instead the following is seen on the screen. Usually there’s no accompanying error message.

Because this error can be resolved easily, including users with little or no technical knowledge, there’s absolutely nothing to worry about.

In this post, we show you different ways in which you can fix the issue. Start with the first solution, and if it doesn’t work, try the next one and so on and so forth.

Solution 1 – Use Task Manager To Close Chrome

The first thing you need to do is close chrome forcefully and then restart it. Here are the steps you need to follow to close Chrome through Task Manager.

1. Press Ctrl+Alt+Del
2. Select Start Task Manager option (usually it is the last option in the list)
3. Click the Application tab
4. Select Chrome in the list of current tasks running on your computer
5. Click the End Task button

Solution 2 – Configure Chrome Settings

If the problem persists, open Chrome settings and uncheck the box before “Use hardware acceleration when available”.

Several Chrome users have said that this step has worked for them and it may help resolve the Youtube issue in your case, too. So it is definitely worth a shot.

Here are the steps you need to follow:

1. Open Chrome
2. Click the three dots on the top-right corner of your Chrome window
3. Next click Settings
4. Click Advanced Settings (located at the bottom of the Settings page)
5. Browse to the System section, turn off “Use hardware acceleration when available”

1. Close the Chrome window
2. Reopen it and check if the issue is resolved

Solution 3 – Clear Cache

Try clearing the cache if the problem persists. Here are the steps to follow:

1. Launch Chrome
2. Click the three dots on the top-right corner of your Chrome window
3. Click More tools and then select Clear browsing data
4. Make sure the check boxes before Cached images and file and Cookies and other site and plugin data are clicked
5. From the drop-down menu at the top select the beginning of time
6. Next click the clear browsing data button

1. Close the Chrome window
2. Reopen it and check if the issue is resolved

Solution 4 – Disable Problematic Extension

Sometimes the YouTube issue is because of installed extensions. Therefore, you should disable the installed extensions one by one to locate the extension that’s the root cause of this problem.

Here are the steps to follow:

1. Start Chrome
2. Click the three dots on the top-right corner of your Chrome window
3. Click More tools and then click Extensions
4. Uncheck the box before the first listed extension, close Chrome, restart it and check if the issue is resolved

1. Now repeat this step for all extensions one by one
2. If you find that disabling a particular extension allows YouTube videos to play on Chrome, you can safely deduce that this extension was causing the problem. Therefore delete this extension by clicking the remove button or the recycle button (depending on your Chrome version)
3. Restart Chrome

Solution 5 – Reinstall Chrome

If the problem is not because of extensions, you should uninstall Chrome and then reinstall it.

It would be a good idea to export your bookmarks before uninstalling Chrome. Once you’ve reinstalled Chrome, you can simply import your bookmarks.

Export Bookmarks

1. Start Chrome
2. Click the three dots on the top-right corner of your Chrome window
3. Click Bookmarks and then select Bookmarks Manager
4. Click the three dots on the top-right corner of your Bookmarks Manager window
5. Next Select Export Bookmarks

1. Decide where you would like to save the file, give it a name, and then click the Save button

Uninstall Chrome

Once you’ve made a backup copy of your Chrome bookmarks, you can safely uninstall Chrome. To do the same, perform these steps:

1. Type Control Panel in the start search box and then press Enter to launch the Control Panel window
2. Click Programs and Features
3. In the list of programs, locate and right-click Google Chrome and then click Uninstall
4. Windows will now uninstall Chrome. The whole process shouldn’t take more than a minute.

Install Chrome

Once Chrome in uninstalled, you can go to the Google Chrome website, download the latest Chrome version, and install it.

Here are the steps to follow.

1. Go to the Google Chrome official website
2. Click the Download Chrome button
3. In the Google Chrome Terms of Services window, select Set Google Chrome as my default browser
4. Click Accept and Install
5. Once Chrome is installed, launch it to import bookmarks

Import Bookmarks

1. Start Chrome
2. Click the three dots on the top-right corner of your Chrome window
3. Click Bookmarks and then select Bookmarks Manager
4. Click the three dots on the top-right corner of your Bookmarks Manager window
5. Next Select Import Bookmarks

1. Now browse to the location where you’d stored the file containing your bookmarks, select that file, and click Open

Solution 6 – Update Your Video Drivers

Did you know that outdated video drivers can cause a host of problems, including the aforementioned YouTube issue?

That’s why it is necessary that you keep your video drivers updated.

If the above-listed solutions have not worked for you, there’s a strong chance that your video driver is either outdated or corrupt. In both cases, you need to install the latest video drivers.

How can you do that?

Well, there are two ways. You can update drivers manually through device manager or install them automatically using a reliable and quick driver update tool.

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