v0.23.8 Beta

[efb4f5ff-1298-471a-8973-3d47447115dc]

Summary

This hotfix release fixes the This video is unavailable errors.

Important

Video loading times have increased because YouTube's servers now return errors if you attempt to start a video before the preroll ads have finished. While FreeTube skips the ads, it still has to wait until the preroll ad sequence completes before the video can begin playing. This is a limitation imposed by YouTube’s servers, and it also affects other YouTube-related projects, such as yt-dlp.

Fixes

• Wait for pre-roll ads to finish in /player request by @absidue in Wait for pre-roll ads to finish in /player request #7887

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This discussion was created from the release v0.23.8 Beta.

[h3Iloworld]

I just recently got this bug and I couldn't watch anything. The fact you fixed it in under a week is pretty cool.

[Tetriser]

I suppose the video loading delay is a good compromise while SABR implementation is still in development (god knows when it'll work perfectly)

[absidue]

@Tetriser It's not a compromise and it won't go away with SABR, it is just the way it is now. The only way to not have a delay is to only watch videos that don't have pre-roll ads enabled or to use YouTube's official website with YouTube premium.

[Tetriser]

That's a shame, but I'd take longer loading times than having to watch ads over and over