Fix: YouTube Videos Not Playing on Android and iPhone

YouTube’s growth in recent years has been exponential. It has billions of users all around the globe. The majority of them are mobile phone users as the YouTube application for Android and iOS is super easy to use. In fact, it has become a part of our daily lives. From streaming movies to watching tutorials, the video-sharing platform has endless content for all types of users. But what if the YouTube video stops playing on your phone?

Suppose you are in the middle of a tutorial and then YouTube starts showing errors like “Connection to server lost. Tap to retry” or “There was a problem while playing”. Sometimes, the video just keeps on buffering endlessly.

For me, YouTube is the biggest source of knowledge. I do watch a lot of videos every day to learn new things. And therefore, seeing errors in the middle o

f a video or just after playing a video is naturally frustrating. Some users have also reported playing issues with downloaded YouTube videos.

Whether YouTube greets you with an error or the video endlessly buffers, these are quick ways to deal with the problem. In this guide, we are going to show you different ways of fixing if the YouTube videos are not playing on Android and iPhone.

Before diving into the troubleshooting methods, it is crucial to understand the reason causing the YouTube video to not load properly on your mobile phone. It will help you effectively troubleshoot the problem.

Reasons Why YouTube Videos Are Not Playing On Your Android/iPhone

These are common reasons for the failure of YouTube video playback on a smartphone:

• Problem with your internet connection: In most cases, the internet connection is the source of the problem. Perhaps, your device has a slow or unstable connection. To watch videos on YouTube, you need at least a decent speed internet connection, and that too should be stable.
• YouTube app may be outdated: The YouTube app on your phone may be outdated, resulting in performance or playback issues. Update the app to its latest version to enjoy the best experience and performance.
• Corrupted app cache: The cache data for the YouTube app may have got corrupted, resulting in video playback issues. You can easily fix it just by clearing the app cache.
• Incorrect date and time: An incorrect date and time on your mobile phone may cause sync issues with YouTube servers. This can lead to playback issues on YouTube.
• Conflicting third-party apps: There are plenty of YouTube downloaders or modded versions of YouTube available on the internet. Some of them have been found to be conflicting with the original YouTube app in the past. It can result in video playback issues.

Your phone is most likely to have been affected by one of these issues. In case you have identified the case, navigate to the corresponding solution. Otherwise, apply the fixes in the same order in which they are presented.

13 Methods to Fix If YouTube Videos Are Not Playing On Android or iPhone

We have identified effective solutions to fix the video playback issues on your Android or iPhone. Apply the solutions one by one until the problem is fixed.

1. Check if YouTube Is Down

First things first, when YouTube videos are not playing check whether YouTube servers are down. YouTube does not have an official page to check its current server status. However, you can use a third-party website such as downdetector.com to check if other users are also facing issues.

If you can’t play YouTube videos due to server issues, you can’t do anything rather than waiting for the engineers to fix it. YouTube rarely faces outages. Even when it occurs, the service is restored within an hour.

2. Check Your Internet Connection

Most of the time, fixing video playback issues on YouTube is as simple as disconnecting and connecting to the internet again. Your internet connection may be very slow or unstable causing issues with YouTube videos.

Check if your mobile data or Wi-Fi is performing as expected. For this, you can run an internet speed test using speedtest.net. Analyze the result and if you think the connection is slow, perform these steps (if you’re connected to Wi-Fi):

1. Remove “YouTube” from recent apps.
2. Open the “Settings” app on your phone.
3. Go to “Connections” and tap on “Wi-Fi”.
4. Press and hold your Wi-Fi network and select “Forget”.
5. Tap on your Wi-Fi network and enter the password.

These steps are valid for Android phones. For iPhone users, the steps are as follows:

1. Go to “Settings” and tap on “Wi-Fi”.
2. Click the “info button” next to the connected network.
3. Tap on “Forget This Network”.
4. Click “Forget”.
5. Connect to your Wi-Fi network again. You’ll be required to enter the password.

After resetting the Wi-Fi connection on your phone, launch the YouTube app to check if you can play videos. If the problem persists, reboot the router. It will increase the connection speed and the connection stability should also go up.

You can reboot your Wi-Fi router via the router’s settings page. Or, simply unplug the power cable, wait for a minute, and then plug it in again.

3. Restart Your Phone

Software bugs or glitches often occur on smartphones, and they can also contribute to YouTube playback issues. Restarting the device is a quick remedy to fix these issues. Also, It cleans up temporary data and removes background processes. So, your device should perform better after that.

To restart your Android smartphone, press and hold the power button and select “Restart” from the power menu. On some devices, you must press the power and volume down buttons to get the power menu.

If you’re an iPhone user, press and hold the power button and either of the volume button until the slider appears. Drag the slider to power off your device. Now, hold down the power button until you see the Apple logo.

4. Set the Correct Date and Time

If your phone has an incorrect date or time (or both), Google services (including YouTube) may not be able to sync properly with servers. This could be why YouTube videos are not playing on your Android or iPhone.

Check the date and time of your device to ensure they align with the date and time of your current region. If they are not, set them right via the settings.

If you are an iPhone user, open the Settings app, go to General, and tap Date & Time. Make sure the Set Automatically option is selected.

The Date and Time option is available on most Android phones within the Advanced Settings section. Ensure the Automatic date & time and Automatic time zone options are enabled. When you move to a new region, it will automatically change the time zone.

5. Clear YouTube App Cache

Just like any other app, YouTube also stores cache. These are nothing but temporary data that helps in making the app perform better. Although these are helpful, they can sometimes get corrupted and cause issues with loading videos. Try clearing the cache for the YouTube app and check if the YouTube video plays afterward.

On Android:

1. Open the “Settings” app.
2. Tap on “Apps” to see all installed apps. This step may be different on your phone. You have to open the app list.
3. Find “YouTube” and tap on it.
4. Tap on “Storage” and click “Clear Cache.”

After applying the steps, restart your Android phone. Launch the YouTube app and try playing a video to check if the problem is fixed.

On iPhone:

1. Go to “Settings” and tap on “General”.
2. Scroll down until you see “YouTube” and tap on it.
3. Turn on the “Reset cache on next start” option.

When your launch the YouTube app next time, your iPhone will automatically clear the cache.

6. Reduce the Video Quality

The YouTube videos are probably not playing because your internet speed is not good enough or the display does not support very high resolution. For example, when you try to play 4K videos on a low-end Android phone, the video may continue to load for hours. Even the screen goes blank.

To check if this is causing the problem, reduce YouTube video quality to 240p or 360p. If the video plays afterward, you need a better connection or a new phone to play high-resolution videos. However, if the problem stays, you would want to try more solutions.

7. Update the YouTube App

Your device may be running an older version of YouTube, causing video playback issues. Although an older version should work just fine, you shouldn’t use it as the latest version incorporates the latest security features and compatibility with the latest devices. Update the YouTube app to check if the latest version includes a fix for the playback issue.

To update the YouTube app, go to Google Play Store (Android) or App Store (iPhone), search for YouTube, and tap the Update button. If you can’t see the update option, your device already has the latest version.

8. Uninstall Conflicting Third-Party Apps

There are dozens of modified YouTube apps and third-party apps on the internet which may offer extra features and premium features for free. You shouldn’t be installing them as they can steal your data. On top of this, they can conflict with the original YouTube app and may cause issues.

Remove them individually, and try playing a YouTube video to find the culprit. Remove the conflicting app and install others (if necessary).

9. Turn off the VPN

Using a reliable VPN service is recommended for your online privacy, but sometimes, it can cause issues such as YouTube videos not playing. It mainly occurs when the VPN server your device is connected to is busy or facing technical issues.

10. Sign out and Sign in Again

If the above solutions have not worked in your favor, try signing out and signing in to your account again on the YouTube app.

11. Reset the Network Settings

YouTube videos are not playing, probably, because of incorrect network settings. Try resetting the network settings on your phone. Do keep in mind that this will remove all saved Wi-Fi networks and paired Bluetooth devices.

On Android:

1. Open the “Settings” app.
2. Go to “General management” and click “Reset”.
3. Tap on “Reset network settings”.
4. Click “Reset settings”.

These steps may be different on your phone. All you have to do is to find the reset network settings option and tap on it.

On iPhone: 

1. Launch the “Settings” app.
2. Go to “General”.
3. Scroll down to “Transfer or reset iPhone” and tap on it.
4. Select “Reset” and tap on “Reset Network Settings”.
5. Click “Reset Network Settings” again to confirm.

After resetting the network settings, connect to your Wi-Fi or mobile data, and check if you can play YouTube videos without any issues.

12. Install Pending System Update

Manufacturers regularly push new software updates for their phones, which bring many improvements, new features, and bug fixing. If your phone has a software bug causing issues with YouTube, updating the device could fix it.

Steps to update your phone (Android):

1. Connect your device to the internet.
2. Launch the “Settings” app.
3. Go to “Software Update”.
4. Tap on “Download and install”.

Steps to update your phone (iPhone):

1. Connect your device to the internet.
2. Go to the “Settings” app and tap on “General”.
3. Click “Software Update”.
4. If there’s a pending update, tap on “Download and Install”.

After the update installation is finished, reboot your phone. Launch the YouTube app and try playing videos.

13. Factory Reset Your Phone

Try factory resetting your Android or iPhone as the last resort to fix the YouTube videos not playing issue before reaching out to YouTube support. This should fix all sorts of problems on your device and eventually, you’ll have a working YouTube app.

On Android:

1. Go to the “Settings” app.
2. Tap on “System”.
3. Click “Reset options” and tap on “Erase all data (factory reset)”.
4. Tap on “Erase all data”.
5. Confirm your lock screen (if prompted).

On iPhone:

1. Go to “Settings” and click “General”.
2. Tap on “Transfer or Reset iPhone”.
3. Click “Reset”.
4. Select “Reset All Settings”.

After the factory reset is done, you will need to set up your device again.

Wrapping It Up

Most of us rely on YouTube for different purposes – entertainment, news, tutorials, etc. When the service goes down, things may get difficult. Thankfully, there are numerous ways to fix the problem, which we just walked you through in this article. We hope one of the solutions helped you fix the YouTube videos not playing issue on Android or iPhone.