YouTube will now let you hide those pesky end screens

YouTube will finally let you dismiss the pop-ups that fill your screen with recommendations at the end of a video. Now, when you come across an end screen, you can select a new “hide” button in the top-right corner of the video so you can finish what you’re watching without distractions. YouTube says it’s making the change in response to feedback that viewers want to be able to “focus on the content they’re watching.” I’ve long looked for ways to hide these screens, as they sometimes cover the tail end of the video I’m trying to watch and make it difficult to see what’s happening. YouTube notes that when you select the “hide” button, it only applies to the video you’re watching — not all of them on the platform. You can also bring back the end screen by selecting the “show” button. YouTube found that this didn’t have a substantial impact on a creator’s view count while testing the feature, as it says the “hide” button resulted in just a 1.5 percent decrease in views stemming from end screen clickthroughs. In addition to this change, YouTube is removing the “subscribe” button that appears when you hover your mouse over a channel’s watermark on desktop. Doing this will “simplify and improve the viewing experience,” according to YouTube, as the platform already displays a subscribe button directly beneath videos. Neither of these updates will affect how creators make videos, as they can continue to add end screens and watermarks.