Many factors can cause YouTube video streaming issues. By troubleshooting your internet or device connection, you can play your videos again.
If you’ve seen one of these notifications, you may be experiencing a video streaming issue:
- An error has occurred.
- Playback error. Tap to retry.
- Connection to server lost.
- This video is unavailable.
- Something went wrong. Tap to Retry.
Troubleshoot internet and device connection
You can play your YouTube videos again by following the steps below for internet and device connections.
Internet speed
The quality of your home or mobile network can affect how smoothly YouTube videos play, and whether videos play in HD.
The table below shows the approximate speeds recommended to play each video format. The actual speed that your device gets may vary from the number you see when you run an 'Internet speed test.' This difference is due to factors including WiFi performance, time of day, and how your ISP connects to YouTube. If there are multiple devices on your network, then the connection is shared between them which may reduce the speed that your device gets.
|
Video Resolution |
Recommended sustained speed |
|---|---|
| 4K | 20 Mbps |
| HD 1080p | 5 Mbps |
| HD 720p | 2.5 Mbps |
| SD 480p | 1.1 Mbps |
| SD 360p | 0.7 Mbps |
To find out if your internet Service Provider is HD Verified, visit the Video Quality Report.
If you're interested in seeing more info on how your videos are streaming, check out Stats for Nerds.
Smart TVs, Chromecast, and game consoles
- Restart the YouTube app.
- Restart your device: hard restart (disconnect power and reconnect).
- For game consoles: Uninstall and reinstall the YouTube app.
- Update your device’s firmware/system software.
- Check if any of your browser extensions that block ads affect video playback.
- If you have many browser tabs open, try to close most of them except the one you’re using for YouTube.
- Restart your browser.
- Restart your router.
- Restart your computer.
- Update your browser to the latest version.
- Use Chrome.