YouTube makes a change users have long wanted

In 2025, Google’s YouTube made several major upgrades, some of which frustrated users and some of which pleased them.

In a world of fierce competition, it’s hard to maintain the status of the second-biggest social platform after Facebook. Meeting user demands and keeping up with competitors required constant enhancements.

However, these improvements have sometimes led to drawbacks. For example, early in 2025, users pushed back on YouTube’s updated comment section interface, calling it unnecessary or annoying, according to Dexerto.

Similarly, a controversial video player redesign drew criticism for shrinking usable space and upsetting long-time users, per a poll by Android Authority.

Despite these bumps, in March 2025, YouTube reached 125 million YouTube Music and Premium subscribers globally, a major milestone. It also expanded its Premium Lite pilot in the U.S., letting viewers watch most videos ad-free for $7.99 per month, according to YouTube’s official blog.

Over several months, YouTube rolled out new tools to enhance services. These included generative features powered by Google DeepMind’s Veo 3, such as AI-generated video backgrounds, motion effects, and “Edit with AI,” which turns raw clips into a first-draft video.

The platform also enabled more creators to test different titles on their videos, and in December, introduced 30-second voice replies to comments, improving the experience for millions of creators.

Now, YouTube is making headlines again for upgrading the way we find videos.

*YouTube adds a long-awaited Shorts filter option.*

Image source: Shutterstock

YouTube now allows you to filter Shorts out of search results

On January 8, 2026, YouTube announced several changes to its search filters. The most significant change pertains to filtering for both short-form and long-form videos. Up until now, users couldn’t choose to view only one format, and they would get results with both short and long formats mixed together.

Not being able to filter between two very different formats was frustrating a number of users, and now YouTube has responded.

“Hi everyone! We’ve heard your feedback and are enhancing the search experience by updating our filters to make them more effective and intuitive for everyone,” Hank from Team YouTube shared.

This suggests a number of users have already requested some of these upgrades.

“Our goal is to equip you with more effective advanced search tools, ensuring you can consistently and efficiently locate the content you love,” the post continues.

Now, in the “Type” menu, there’s a new Shorts filter, enabling viewers to choose between Shorts or VODs (long-form videos).

The update is being deployed on mobile and web, but may not be visible to all users yet, as rollout timing can vary by region and device, according to Android Central.

YouTube’s key additions and removals

Filtering between Shorts and VODs is not the only change YouTube announced. It shared two more.

New filters and renaming:

Dedicated Content Types: Shorts and VODs.
“Prioritize” Menu: The “Sort By” menu has been renamed “Prioritize.” This refined sorting menu aims to maximize utility.
“Popularity” Filter: The “View Count” sort option has been renamed “Popularity.” This filter allows viewers to easily locate popular videos related to their search queries. YouTube’s systems assess a video’s view count and other relevance signals, such as watch time, to determine its popularity for that specific query.

Source: YouTube Help Center

According to the platform, the idea behind these changes was to simplify the filter menu to make it more intuitive and enhance overall search experience. That’s also why YouTube removed some options that were not working as expected and have warranted user complaints.

Filters removed:

Uploaded Date - Last Hour
Sort by Rating

Users can still find the most recent search results in one of its “Upload Date” filters and explore highly viewed videos with the new “Popularity” filter option.

More details on how to use these search filters appear in YouTube’s Help Center.

Removing Shorts from YouTube search results arrives at the perfect time

There’s no doubt that short-form videos, known on YouTube as Shorts or reels, are extremely popular at a time when instant content is prioritized like never before.

TikTok saw major success, and it launched at a time when YouTube was already an unmatched video platform.

Its triumph was based on its ability to offer something different: short-form video content with a user-friendly interface, allowing for more personal engagement with videos. This format quickly gained widespread popularity among users.

Industry data confirm that short-form videos have extensive viewership, with platforms including YouTube Shorts and TikTok posting higher engagement rates than long-form content and traditional video formats.

Moreover, short‑form videos generate about 2.5× more engagement than long‑form video, and videos under 90 seconds retain about 50% of viewers on average, according to analysis by Marketing LTB.

A growing number of viewers are realizing the significant downsides of short videos, however.

The hidden risks of watching short-form videos

Despite their enormous popularity, Shorts have potential risks.

A number of studies conducted in recent years confirm negative effects of short-form videos on our cognitive abilities and behaviors.

A Psychological Bulletin meta‑analysis of 71 studies involving nearly 100,000 participants found that heavier use of platforms such as TikTok, Instagram Reels, and YouTube Shorts was associated with reduced attention, weaker inhibitory control, and lower working memory performance, reported Business-Standard.

Complementing these findings, EEG research in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience showed that addiction‑like patterns of short‑video use correlated with diminished executive attention control in prefrontal brain regions.

According to a study published in Frontiers in Psychology in December 2023, short-form video addiction can increase academic procrastination both directly and indirectly. In a direct way, addiction to these videos leads to more procrastination. However, in an indirect way, addiction to short-form videos impacts students’ control of their attention (attentional control).

With less attentional control, students are unable to concentrate on academic tasks.

More Entertainment:

A paper published in Emergent Mind suggests that short‑video feeds can impair prospective memory or, in other words, the ability to recall intentions after interruption.

“We found that the TikTok condition significantly degraded the users’ performance in this task. As none of the other conditions (Twitter, YouTube, no activity) had a similar effect, our results indicate that the combination of short videos and rapid context-switching impairs intention recall and execution,” reads the paper.

Even YouTube co-founder Steve Chen told Stanford Business School he wouldn’t want his children watching only short videos on platforms like TikTok or YouTube.

YouTube users welcome change after frustration with Shorts

Although short-form videos remain highly popular, an increasing number of users are growing tired of them.

Just recently, users blasted Disney+ on Reddit for adding vertical videos to its offering. Many expressed disappointment and concern that Disney+ is trying to be more like TikTok and YouTubeShorts, arguing that vertical videos do not belong on a traditional streaming service.

Many subscribers were frustrated with the news, arguing that the platform should focus on quality content instead of “junk” or “social-media-style” clips.

User AdSpecialist6598 shared the news about YouTube’s update, saying, “YouTube’s updated filters are good news for anyone sick of Shorts.” The thread quickly generated many responses, gaining 1,000 upvotes and more than 80 comments.

Overall sentiment is slightly positive, though comments show mixed reactions. Many users expressed frustration with YouTube’s services and algorithm.

User Professional-Fig6513, wrote “YouTube search has been f**ked for a while. Results are influenced by your personal algorithm too much. It makes it really annoying to find content outside your normal ‘bubble.’”

Some users, on the other hand, criticized limitations, arguing it would be better if there were no Shorts at all.

“Damnit I thought they were going to announce you can turn them off,” user Giotapatio wrote.

A number of comments, such as one from mosaic_hops, revealed how some users are simply tired of Shorts. “Oh my god I hate shorts. Not only are they awful, poor quality and devoid of real content, but parental controls don’t work on them at all! So we had to take YouTube away from the kids…”

The bottom line is that while a number of users may welcome a complete elimination of short videos, there are probably far more who still enjoy watching this content.

To remain the king of video platforms, YouTube must find ways to satisfy different preferences. It may ultimately mean keeping Shorts, but enabling users to remove them from their search results.