On many sites, you have probably come across a function in which, while scrolling your feed, the published video begins to play automatically. Some people find this function very convenient and cool, while others find it annoying. We, dear readers, do not know which type of these people you belong to. However, we are sure that this article will seem very interesting to you, because this “feature” has appeared on VKontakte as of today.
Our editors try to publish news about updates to the VKontakte social network as soon as possible. So, don’t forget to subscribe to our website updates to always be the first to know about VK updates. But this was only a small retreat. Now let's talk about the fun part.
Blocking with extensions
If the above method does not solve the problem and the videos continue to start automatically, then you should try installing a special extension. Here are some of them.
Adblock Plus
In general, Adblock is designed to block advertising windows, banners and alerts. But since most of the automatically launched videos are advertising, this extension will also block them.
To install Adblock Plus, you need to go to the official website of the developer, and from there download and install the latest version of the extension. This process takes place automatically.
After installation, the application logo will appear in the upper right corner - if you click on it, a small menu will open in which you can disable the extension on a specific website.
Download link: https://adblockplus.org
Ways to close videos on VK
The VK social network offers all the possibilities for flexible configuration of the privacy of the section with video recordings. Videos can be hidden from everyone or from specific users, or left available only to friends. Here's how to do it:
- From your page, go to the “Video” section, and then to the “My videos” tab.
- Select the video you want to hide from prying eyes. This can be done either manually in the window that opens or using the search bar.
- Place the cursor over the selected video and select the “Pencil” icon, which symbolizes the editing mode.
- In the form that appears, set the file visibility option to “Only me.”
- Click the “Save settings” button.
Now access to the video will be blocked from other users. And in the lower left corner of the picture corresponding to the video, the “Lock” icon will appear.
Mozilla Firefox and Opera
The automatic launch of Flash content playback in Mozilla Firefox and Opera is disabled in much the same way: all we need is to configure the launch of the content of this plugin on demand (Click to Play).
In Mozilla Firefox, click the settings button to the right of the address bar, select Add-ons, and then go to Plugins.
Set the Shockwave Flash plugin to “Play on demand” and the video will no longer play automatically.
In Opera, go to Settings, select "Sites", and then in the "Plugins" section, set the "On request" option instead of "Run all plugin content". If necessary, you can add certain sites to exceptions.
Automatic video playback on the VKontakte social network:
- Sergey Post author 01/19/2016
Denis, thank you, it’s a very interesting topic, but is auto-playing videos annoying, then most likely not, I recently went to a video streaming site and there is such a thing when you point at a video, it automatically plays - that’s cool, why click again. .
Well, it plays here when you move the mouse, and not automatically! By the way, Denis, how can I make the video start playing after hovering over it with the mouse?
I saw this trick for the first time on Facebook and had no idea that it was so easy to do it yourself! Already done it in my group on VK! Happened! Works! Although, to be honest, I don’t really like it myself.
Denis, thank you! A very interesting point, I’ll have to test it and see how it turns out!
I would immediately unsubscribe from a group that forces me to watch videos in this way.
How to disable autoplay in Youtube
There are two types of autoplay for YouTube videos. The first refers to promotional videos that appear on the site's home page and play automatically as soon as you open the site. Most often this is advertising content. The second type of autoplay concerns videos in playlists. Recently, YouTube videos are downloaded one after another by default. Some users like it, but not all. This can be customized.
Disabling autoplay for HTML5 videos in YouTube
For videos played using HTML5, everything is not so simple and standard browser tools do not currently allow you to disable its automatic launch. There are browser extensions for these purposes, and one of the most popular is Magic Actions for Youtube (which allows you not only to disable automatic video, but also much more), which exists in versions for Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Opera and Yandex Browser.
You can install the extension from the official website https://www.chromeactions.com (downloading occurs from official browser extension stores). After installation, go to the settings of this extension and set the “Stop Autoplay” item.
Done, now the YouTube video will not start automatically, but you will see the usual Play button to play.
There are other extensions, the most popular ones include AutoplayStopper for Google Chrome, which can be downloaded from the application store and browser extensions.
Disable automatic playback of Flash videos in Chrome
Update 2021: Starting with version Google Chrome 66, the browser itself began to block automatic video playback on sites, but only those that have sound. If the video has no sound, it is not blocked.
This method is suitable for disabling the automatic launch of videos in Odnoklassniki - Flash video is used there (however, this is not the only site for which the information may be useful).
Everything necessary for our purpose is already in the Google Chrome browser in the Flash plugin settings. Go to your browser settings and then click on the “Content Settings” button or you can simply enter chrome://chrome/settings/content into the Chrome address bar.
Find the "Plugins" section and select the "Request permission to run plugin content" option. After that, click "Done" and exit Chrome settings.
Now the video (Flash) will not automatically launch; instead of playing, you will be prompted to “Click the right mouse button to launch Adobe Flash Player” and only after that will playback begin.
You will also see a notification about a blocked plugin on the right side of your browser's address bar - by clicking on it, you can allow them to be automatically downloaded for a specific site.
Disable autoplay while watching
You can disable autoplay on YouTube on any computer and in any browser. This is not a permanent solution to the problem, you may have to repeat it over and over again, but it will stop autoplay for the rest of the session.
Step 1: Open any YouTube video.
Step 2: Once the YouTube video starts playing, you will see a playlist that is automatically created by the system for later playback. Above this list you will see a blue switch with the corresponding label. Turn it off.
Now, after one video has finished playing, the system will not turn on a new one. She will only offer a choice.
The second way to disable autoplay in YouTube:
- Click the gear icon of the YouTube video you're playing.
Once you turn off autoplay, it will affect not only the current YouTube video, but also all other videos you watch from the same YouTube account or on a computer with the same browser and cookies.
Note! This is only a temporary measure. When you restart your computer or log in to your account again, the settings will be the same again. Autoplay may be enabled by default.
Who needs it?
Of course, a reader interested in the VKontakte social network may wonder: “Who needs this anyway? A strong “trick” for me... Indeed, it seems to us that this function is necessary only for video bloggers, as well as media and communities that specialize in video content. For the average user, this function, frankly speaking, can even be annoying. Therefore, perhaps in the future there will be an option that will allow the average user to turn on or off automatic video playback in Contact. Unfortunately, there is no such option yet. So we told you everything we knew about this interesting update on our favorite social network. It is worth noting that this function is “fresh”, so it will still be completed, updated, and soon we will see something that will satisfy both one category of users and another, which we wrote about at the beginning of our article. By the way, if you are an administrator of any VKontakte community and you are interested in video content, do not forget to read our article about what a VKontakte video cover is and how to set it up.
NETOBSERVER.RU
It seems that the VKontakte developers have a new tradition - taking something not very good from more successful sites and implementing it under the pretext “it will be better this way.” This happened with the uncontested change of the VKontakte interface to something “unique and original”, and this also happened with what was announced as “ Autoplay of VKontakte videos”. There is simply no other explanation why a very controversial function, introduced in the foreign social network Facebook back in 2013 and which attracted a lot of negativity, has now migrated to our beloved vk.com. The main complaints for the introduction of the HTTP Live Streaming option (abbreviated as HLS), which fell to the share of Facebook, are the significantly increased traffic (which is critical for using the mobile Internet, for example), as well as a certain moral aspect: often the video that ends up in the user’s feed itself the user would not look voluntarily by specifically clicking on it. Now please – no need to click, everything will start on its own!
A few words about HLS - this protocol was developed by Apple (rejoice, Yabloko people) to suit its needs, but very quickly spread across the Internet, displacing all other media data transfer standards. The essence of this protocol is sequential compression (with different bitrates), segmenting the stream into pieces of a sufficiently small size and generating a file (often called a playlist) containing data about the stream and its segments. On the side of the user device, the following happens: first, a playlist with metadata is downloaded, and then “pieces” of the stream are downloaded (in our case, video), and when downloading each segment, the bandwidth of the user channel is analyzed. This is good for the user because, thanks to a timely reaction to changes in channel characteristics, the video will become worse / better in quality, while ensuring the absence of freezes (such as buffering) and other annoying brakes. Is the use of this technology when autoplaying VKontakte videos a concern for the user? Not even once: a significant increase in user-downloaded traffic will still occur.
It’s worth clarifying, however, that the HLS autoplay technology, thanks to the efforts of vk.com developers (or rather, the lack thereof), has not yet reached mobile platforms - autoplay of Vkontakte videos currently only works in the full version. But caring developers promise to fix this defect soon
