A YouTube executive made a notable admission about the relevance of subscriptions on the platform, confirming that subscribers won’t see everything uploaded by a subscribed channel under most circumstances. I talk about this in my latest video.
It all started with a tweet on X from Rene Richie, the “YouTube liaison,” who responded to a query about the algorithm and its impact on visibility. Richie replied to a question from Curtis Judd, a content creator focused on audio and visual production tools who frequently hears from subscribers that they never see his content being uploaded.
Richie’s response shed light on YouTube’s current stance on subscriptions. He emphasized that YouTube doesn’t push content from creators; instead, it pulls content based on viewer behavior. Richie says this is largely dictated by time constraints on the viewer.
He adds that subscribers can always access content through the subscription feed, but YouTube hasn’t updated the subscription feed in years. It often becomes a chaotic, chronological fire hose, that works very differently across the various viewing platforms YouTube supports. The feed lacks sorting and filtering tools for those with a large number of subscriptions.
Moreover, the YouTube homepage recommendation algorithm considers various factors, such as how recently a viewer subscribed and their current viewing habits. This means that if a viewer subscribed to a channel years ago and doesn’t religiously watch every single video that channel uploads, YouTube might deprioritize those older subscriptions. This can lead to a situation where the platform essentially decides the subscription status on behalf of the viewer, rather than allowing users to manage their subscriptions actively.
This system presents significant challenges especially for channels like mine that cover a wide range of tech content. Not every subscriber will be interested in every upload, which frequently demotes me to the bottom of the barrel for recommendations. The result is that a vast majority of my nearly 360,000 subscribers are never even given the choice to watch my content – they never see the thumbnail.
Data from my channel shows a marked decline in thumbnail impressions from the subscription feed over the years, despite a steadily growing subscriber base. This indicates that fewer people are using the subscription tab because it just isn’t useful to most users.
I’ve developed alternative ways to connect with my audience, such as email lists and a dedicated blog. These platforms allow me to share all my content regularly, giving the viewer the choice to watch or not. I’ve also set up a short URL, at https://lon.tv/latest that viewers can bookmark to always see my most recent uploads.
This brings us back to the subscription feed being a hot mess. Because it is mostly a fire hose of content, users with large feeds will only effectively see content posted around the time they log in. If a viewer’s favorite creator posts at a time opposite that viewer’s regular viewing hours the post will get buried – especially if they viewer has a large subscription base.
The user interface varies significantly across devices too. On desktop, it’s a mix of live channels and a chronological list of videos from subscribed channels with very few fitting on screen at once. On a TV, there’s a semblance of organization with frequently watched channels appearing at the top but no way to control what channels get pinned to the top of that list. The mobile version offers filters like ‘Live,’ ‘videos only,’ and ‘Continue Watching’, but the overall experience is still difficult to manage – especially if the viewer is subscribed to channels that dump a whole bunch of content at once. The mobile interface also has a “most relevant” list of channels pinned to the top of the screen but lacks a means of deciding which channels go in that spot.
To navigate these limitations, I’ve resorted to using an RSS reader, a tool that some might find archaic but is surprisingly effective and still a backbone of digital content distribution. RSS allows me to categorize and follow my favorite channels along with the ability to filter those channels by topic. This method ensures I never miss content from creators I genuinely care about even if I don’t watch every single one of their videos. The best part is that consuming videos from the RSS feed helps improve my recommendations as I’m consuming content that genuinely interests me.
Despite these efforts, the core issue remains. YouTube’s current system of managing subscriptions is flawed, allowing the subs tab feature to rot away in a subtle effort to push users to use the recommendations instead. While these recommendations can help discover new content, they should not supplant a well-functioning subscription system. Users deserve the ability to tailor their viewing experience, deciding which channels to prioritize and de-prioritize if they so choose.
So what would I fix? First, give the user the ability to maintain a list of favorites at the top of the sub feed (similar to the mobile and TV experience). We already have a “bell” to click for notifications so bell clicked channels would be an easy way to implement this feature.
Next, YouTube should “stack” videos in the sub feed from channels that dump a bunch of content all at once. A great example are my local news channels that upload all of their news packages at the same time which fills my feed. This apparently is a feature that YouTube is “experimenting” with – but like most sub feed experiments they rarely come to fruition.
A “stretch goal” for me would also be to have some <gasp> algorithmic filtering options based on the video topic. This would be similar to how recommendations can be sorted by topic. This might help re-surface channels a viewer has missed based on what kind of content mood they are in.
But that’s it – YouTube really doesn’t need to do much to make the sub feed just a little bit better to attract more usage. But it’s likely they don’t want to do anything that takes viewers off the home page.
My video generated a huge response from viewers. Many agreed with my concerns and many others posted to say that the current system is working just fine for them. Curious, I put up a poll on my community tab (unscientific of course) to see how many subscriptions those who liked the current sub feed have on their list. The result? More than half, 54%, have less than 100! I have well over 1,000 that I’ve accumulated over nearly 20 years.
Improving the subscription tab would not only enhance user satisfaction but also help improve recommendations for content discovery. It’s a win-win for everyone in my humble opinion.. So why not do it?