iv-org/invidious

Invidious is an open source alternative interface for watching YouTube. Instead of going to YouTube's website directly, where you get ads, tracking cookies, and algorithms designed to keep you watching, you visit an Invidious instance that fetches the same videos from YouTube behind the scenes and presents them in a clean, minimal interface. The key point is that Invidious never uses YouTube's official APIs, which means YouTube's tracking infrastructure is largely bypassed. The main appeal is privacy and simplicity. Invidious works without JavaScript enabled in your browser, shows no ads, does no tracking, and lets you subscribe to YouTube channels without a Google account. Your subscriptions and watch history live on the Invidious server (or in your own account on a self-hosted instance) rather than in Google's databases. It also supports audio-only playback, useful for listening to video content like podcasts in the background on mobile. You can import your existing YouTube subscriptions and watch history, and export them to other privacy-focused video apps like FreeTube or NewPipe. Anyone can use Invidious right now by picking a public server from a community-maintained list. People who want full control can host their own instance, which also means their data never touches a third-party server. A browser extension called Privacy Redirect can automatically send any YouTube link you click through Invidious instead. The server-side code is written in Crystal, a compiled language with Ruby-like syntax, and the project is licensed under AGPL v3.