How to stop auto play facebook videos

How to turn off autoplay videos on Facebook, Twitter, Firefox, and more

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Turn off this annoying and potentially harmful feature

By Cameron Faulkner and Barbara Krasnoff

Updated Apr 15, 2021, 9:40 PM UTC|

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Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

You’ve probably been caught off guard by videos that play automatically on Facebook, Twitter, or just across the internet in general. They begin playing as soon as you load a page or (if they’re more deviously implemented) when you start scrolling through a page.

Automatic video play is a feature that, while nice to have when it’s surfacing content that’s related to your interests, can be pretty annoying. Autoplay videos can be harmful, too, exposing you to violent, offensive, or otherwise unwanted content that you shouldn’t have to see by default.

Whether you just want to put an end to autoplay videos on social media platforms or are looking for a more comprehensive fix, we’ve got some tips. Keep in mind that you’ll need to adjust these settings for every device that you use, since your preferences on, say, your phone do not automatically push to your PC.

Illustration by James Bareham / The Verge

Facebook

If you’re using Facebook on your browser, you can turn off autoplay videos this way:

Go to the drop-down menu at the top right of the page.
Select “Settings & Privacy” > “Settings.”
Look for the “Videos” listing on the left-hand menu. Inside of that option is a toggle where you can turn off autoplaying videos.

Facebook has similar options available for its iOS and Android apps:

Using the iOS app

Click the menu button on the bottom of your screen.
Once you’re there, tap “Settings & Privacy,” then “Settings. ”
Scroll down until you find “Media and Contacts,” then tap “Videos and Photos.”
Finally, once you find “Autoplay,” you can turn off the feature.

Using the Android app

Click the menu button at the top right of your screen.
Once you’re there, scroll down and tap “Settings & Privacy,” then “Settings.”
Scroll down until you find “Media and Contacts” and tap on it.
Tap on “Autoplay” and set it to “Never Autoplay Videos.”

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Twitter

Click on “More” in the left-hand menu, and then on “Settings and privacy.”
Select “Accessibility, display, and languages” > “Data usage”
Click on the “Autoplay” setting. You can then switch off the autoplaying of videos on your feed.

Using the iOS and Android apps

Click the profile picture at the top of your phone screen.
Select “Settings and privacy” in the menu.
Navigate to “Data usage,” tap on “Video autoplay” and set it to “Never.”

Instagram

Instagram doesn’t allow for autoplay videos to be turned off, so you’ll have to tread carefully here. Videos won’t autoplay with sound if you use Instagram on your browser. Stopping autoplay on mobile devices is possible, but a little roundabout.

Using a mobile app

Go to your profile page and tap on the three lines in the upper right corner
Go to “Settings” > “Account” > “Cellular Data Use”
For Android: toggle the “Data Saver” on and tap on “High Resolution Media.” If you then select “Never,” then media such as videos won’t load in advance.
For iOS: toggle on “Use Less Data”

Illustration by Alex Castro / The Verge

Reddit, like most sites that host video, autoplays videos by default. However, it’s pretty easy to turn it off.

Using the newest design

Click your username in the upper-right corner and select “User settings” in the menu.
Select the “Feed settings” tab at the top of the page, and toggle off the “Autoplay media” switch.

Using the legacy version

Click “Preferences” next to your username in the top right of the window.
Under “Media,” look for and uncheck “Autoplay Reddit videos on the desktop comments page.”
You’ll need to hit “save options” at the bottom of the screen to put the changes through.

Using the mobile app

Tap the icon next to the search bar, then hit “Settings.”
You’ll see “Autoplay” near the top of the page, and you can easily choose to turn it off.

Photo by Amelia Holowaty Krales / The Verge

Desktop browsers

There are a variety of desktop browsers out there — some of which let you turn off video autoplay and some of which don’t.

Using Google Chrome

If you use Google Chrome and want to turn off video autoplay — you can’t. There used to be an experimental command-line flag that allowed you to turn them off (you can find the flags by typing chrome://flags/ into Chrome’s address field), but it’s disappeared.

You can turn the sound off (which might help a bit):

Tap on the three dots in the upper right corner
Select “Settings” > “Site settings” > “Sound”
Toggle sound off. You can add exceptions for specific sites here.

Using Microsoft Edge

Interestingly, Microsoft’s Edge browser, which is also based on the Chromium open-source design, does let you turn off — well, at least, limit — video autoplay:

Click on the three dots in the upper right corner and select “Settings.”
In the left-hand column, click on “Site Permissions,” and then scroll down to and select “Media autoplay.”

You can either allow audio and video to play automatically or limit it. According to the instructions, whether autoplay will work or not will depend on “how you’ve visited the page and whether you interacted with media in the past.”

Using Firefox

Firefox has a similar feature that lets you turn off autoplay, for the most part.

Click on the three lines in the upper right corner of the browser and select “Preferences.”
In the left-hand column, click on “Privacy & Security.”
Scroll down to the section headed “Permissions” and look for “Autoplay.” Click on the button marked “Settings.”

A drop-down menu will let you allow audio and video, block audio, or block audio and video. You can also specify sites that you want to differ from your defaults — for example, if you block audio and video as a default, but you want to allow it for, say, The Verge.

Using Safari

Safari makes it simple to disable autoplay. In fact, it assumes that you want the feature disabled to begin with. However, if it hasn’t been disabled — or if you want to make some exceptions to the rule — here’s what you do:

While in the app, go to Safari > Preferences in the top menu.
Click on “Websites” in the top menu.
Look for and select “Auto-Play” in the side menu.
Look for the drop-down menu at the bottom right of the window and select “Never Auto-Play.”

As with Firefox, you can whitelist any sites that you want to be an exception to the rule.

Update September 4th, 2020 5:11PM ET: This article was originally published on March 15th, 2019. Most of the entries have been updated.

Update April 15, 2021 5:30PM ET: Additional entries have been updated.

How to Stop Videos From Automatically Playing on Facebook

Autoplaying videos have their place, but can easily become annoying. That's when it's time to learn how to stop videos from automatically playing on Facebook.
Getting it done is easily accomplished — you'll just need to log into Facebook and get to the right settings page.
Here's what you need to know to stop videos from automatically playing on Facebook's desktop version, as well as on the iPhone and Android mobile apps.
Visit Business Insider's homepage for more stories.

Autoplaying videos on Facebook can be great if you're in the mood to conk out in front of a screen for a little while. But they can also be annoying — they can use up your data, play loud noises, and even make your system run slower.

Whatever your reason, there's no shame in wanting to turn autoplay off for good. Luckily, there are ways to turn off the autoplay option for Facebook videos, no matter how you use the site.

Here's how to get it done on the desktop version of Facebook, as well as the iPhone and Android mobile apps:

How to stop videos from automatically playing on Facebook: Desktop

This will only take a minute:

1. Log into Facebook.

2. Click the downward-facing arrow in the top toolbar and click "Settings."

3. Click the "Videos" option in the toolbar on the right side of the screen.

You can edit all your Facebook Video settings from this page. Devon Delfino/Business Insider

4. Next to "Auto-play videos," select "Off" from the drop-down menu.

From there, you can also change the default video quality, as well as turning on or off the video captions option.

How to stop videos from automatically playing on Facebook: iPhone

Since this process goes through your mobile app, you'll need to be logged in to your Facebook account to disable autoplay. Provided you're logged in, here's how to turn it off:

1. Open your Facebook app.

2. Tap the three vertical lines at the bottom of the screen.

3. Scroll down and tap "Settings and Privacy" and then "Settings."

4. Scroll down again to "Media and Contacts" and then tap "Videos and Photos."

5. Tap "Autoplay" and select "Never Autoplay Videos" to turn off auto-play.

How to stop videos from automatically playing on Facebook: Android

Again, you'll need to be logged into your Facebook account for this to work. Here's how to turn of video auto-play through your Android's Facebook app:

1. Open your Facebook app.

2. Tap the three stacked lines at the top of the screen.

3. Select "Settings & Privacy" followed by "Settings."

4. Scroll down and tap "Media and Contacts. "

5. Select "Autoplay."

6. Choose "Never Autoplay Videos."

For both Android and iPhone users, you'll also be able to set videos to autoplay "On Mobile Data and Wi-Fi Connections" or "On Wi-Fi Connections Only" from that final screen.

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Devon Delfino

Devon Delfino is a Brooklyn-based freelance journalist specializing in personal finance, culture, politics, and identity. Her work has been featured in publications such as The Los Angeles Times, Teen Vogue, Business Insider, and CNBC. Follow her on Twitter at @devondelfino.

How do I turn off autoplay for videos in Facebook Feed?

Help Center

Using Facebook

Video on Facebook Watch

We're updating the mobile version of Facebook.com. More

You can change the video autoplay settings at any time.

To change this setting on a mobile browser:

Mobile Classic

Click the icon in the upper right corner of the Facebook window.

Scroll down, tap Settings & Privacy and then Settings.

Scroll down to Preferences and click Media.

Scroll down to the Autoplay section and select one of the options:

Wi-Fi Only - Videos will play automatically only when the device is connected to a Wi-Fi network.

Disable Video Autoplay - Videos will never autoplay.

New version for mobile browser

Click the icon in the top right corner of the Facebook window.

Scroll down and click Settings.

Scroll down to the Media section.

Select Auto play video and tap next to Auto play video when connected to Wi-Fi to turn this feature on or off.

Learn how to stop autoplay videos on your computer, iPhone, or Android device.

You can help us improve the way videos are shown on Facebook by providing feedback on the videos that autoplay in your Feed.

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How do I enable or disable automatic audio for videos in Facebook Feed?

How do I enable subtitles for Facebook videos?

How do I add or remove subtitles from my Facebook video?

Can I hide or report a video on the Facebook Watch TV app?

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How to disable the Automobiles on Facebook on the iPhone, Android

 that video viewing has become our primary source of content consumption. We don't just play Youtube and Netflix videos to watch content, we also end up watching the videos we come across when we scroll through our social media account.

But let's just face it, we've all been subjected to awkward looks and embarrassing looks in public when scrolling through our Facebook feed and out of nowhere a random video starts playing automatically at full volume.

If you're looking for ways to stop Facebook videos from autoplaying, the following post should help you do it on all devices where you can access Facebook.

Related: Change your name to Facebook

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Why should you stop automatic video playback on Facebook?

Video autoplay has been promoted as a feature on several social networks because it eliminates the need to click on a video and wait for it to load. However, for some of us, this feature is more annoying than helpful. If you're wondering why you should stop Facebook videos from autoplaying, here are a few reasons:

Autoplay videos are annoying to say the least: Autoplay videos can be distracting in nature and often take you away from what you were on Facebook for.
This can be embarrassing in most cases: when you're in public places and scrolling through your Facebook feed, auto-playing videos in full can end up disturbing those around you and often make you feel awkward looking at people in public places.
Save data by preventing videos from downloading in the background: If you disable autoplay, Facebook will no longer download additional data in the background to download videos before you click on them. This way you can save money on your mobile phone or Wi-Fi usage.
Prevent unwanted, harmful, violent, or sensitive videos from playing: Not all videos are fun or interesting. Facebook tries to show you videos related to your interests, but some posts may expose you to content that is hateful, offensive, violent, or too sensitive to view. To avoid viewing inappropriate content, it is very useful to turn off autoplay.

Related: How to perform a reverse image search on Facebook

How to turn off Facebook video autoplay

If you are looking for a comprehensive solution to disable Facebook video autoplay on all your devices, the following methods should be all you need.

Online

If you frequently use Facebook on the web and want to disable automatic video playback from there, you can do so using the Facebook Settings & Privacy option, regardless of which web browser you prefer to use.

To get started, open Facebook.com in your preferred web browser and click the down arrow in the top right corner of the Facebook home page.

When the drop-down menu appears, select the Settings and Privacy option.

This should open another menu on top of the existing one. Here, tap on the "Settings" option to go to the next screen.

When the settings page loads, scroll down the page and click the Video tab on the left sidebar.

Video Settings should appear on your screen. To turn off video autoplay, click the drop-down menu next to video autoplay and select the Off option from the menu.

Facebook videos will no longer autoplay.

On iOS

If you have an iPhone or iPad, you can turn off video autoplay in the Facebook app by following these steps. To do this, open the Facebook app on iOS and tap the hamburger menu in the bottom right corner of the screen.

On the next screen, scroll down and select Settings & Privacy.

In the "Settings and Privacy" section, click on the "Settings" option.

When the settings screen loads, scroll down and find the "Media & Contacts" section and then tap on the "Videos & Photos" option inside it.

On the Videos & Photos screen, select the Never Play Videos Automatically option under Autoplay.

You can also leave the "Videos start with sound" switch turned off so that videos don't startle others if they play by mistake.