YouTube already lets its users put a hard stop on their watch time each day, and an update to that feature is giving viewers even more control over their feeds. Anyone who’s sick of YouTube Shorts can now set their time limit for the format to zero, effectively removing it from their YouTube experience altogether.
Users can put a cap on their Shorts time by navigating over to the time management tab in the YouTube app. That toggle first became available last year, but it now boasts a wider range than it did at launch. At the high end, users can cut off their Shorts viewership after two hours of activity. For the real haters, however, that cap can now be set at zero.
As is often the case with this class of features, YouTube’s Shorts time limits don’t actually bar viewers from watching short-form content. Instead, when the cap is reached, the app reminds you that it might be a good time for a break.
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Therefore, it’s not exactly correct to claim that this feature removes Shorts from YouTube, but users who set their time limit to zero won’t see the Shorts shelf on the YouTube homepage, and they will receive the “time’s up” prompt when they watch the first Shorts clip in each browsing session (unless they choose to override previously set limits).
The YouTube users who have complained about the deluge of AI slop on Shorts will surely relish the power to push away the TikTok-style format. YouTube has tried to stay ahead of slop channels, but it undermines that effort by continuously rolling out AI-powered creation features on Shorts. If cleaning up Shorts proves to be easier said than done, letting users closely control their Shorts activity might be the next best thing.
Here’s one burning question related to the Shorts time limit update: How will this change affect YouTube’s short-form viewership? The platform’s decision to become more lenient with its view-counting methods on Shorts has allowed its TikTok competitor to produce some eye-popping numbers. Now that some users will inevitably limit (or outright eliminate) their Shorts time, will we see a significant short-form downturn?
No matter the answer to that question, YouTube’s hands are tied. A recent court decision found Google and Meta liable for the social media addiction that plagues teens who spend too much time on platforms like YouTube. In response, YouTube is making it easier to break that cycle — even if the solution may require setting the Shorts timer to zero.
