YouTube tests hiding views and upload dates, leaves fans bemused (Update: Not what it looks like)

Update, October 30, 2024 (06:27 PM ET): Earlier this week, the internet (or, at least, the subset of it that’s very invested in YouTube) kind of collectively freaked out when the screenshot featured here, appearing to depict a YouTube home page devoid of useful information like upload dates and view counts, started getting attention. No one really seemed to have anything positive to say about it — other than being glad that they weren’t running into this on their own devices. As it turns out, there’s probably a good reason for that, as this wasn’t actually something YouTube was testing at all.

Following up to a thread on X where the screen was shared, the official TeamYouTube account posts that this is not the result of a new interface tweak Google is trying out, but likely a consequence of users installing browser extensions that interfere with the site (via 9to5Google).