How to block YouTube but keep your lectures

By Sameed Ahmad, who builds Focus AI (so read the Focus AI parts with that in mind).
Updated September 2026

Your anatomy lectures are on YouTube. So is the video you watched for three hours last night instead of them. Every blocker you have tried sees one thing, youtube.com, so it either blocks both or neither. You block it, you need a lecture, you unblock it, and the night is gone.

Here are four ways around that, cheapest first, with what each one gives up.

1. Hide the feed, keep the player (free)

Extensions like Unhook remove recommendations, the home feed, autoplay, comments and Shorts. The lecture you open plays normally; the sidebar that pulls you away is gone.

Good for: people whose problem is autoplay and the sidebar. Gives up: the search bar still works, so when the urge is strong you type the rabbit hole in yourself, and turning the filter off is one click.

2. Download or queue lectures before you start (free)

Put the lectures for tonight in a playlist, or save them offline where your course allows it, then block YouTube completely for the session.

Good for: fixed course material. Gives up: the moment you need a video you did not plan for, you are back to unblocking the whole site.

3. Allowlist specific channels or URLs (free, fiddly)

Rule-based blockers such as LeechBlock NG can block youtube.com while allowing URL patterns, for example one playlist or your professor's channel.

Good for: one course with one source. Gives up: real studying pulls from many channels, and every new one means editing rules mid-session, which is exactly when you are most likely to switch everything off.

4. Block by task, not by site

This is what I built Focus AI for, so weigh it accordingly. You type what you are studying and pick a session length. Every page is judged against that task. The SN2 lecture loads. The recommended video essay does not. Shorts do not. There is no list to maintain, so there is nothing to unblock when you need a new source.

Good for: studying that really does live on YouTube, Google and Reddit. Strict mode is on by default, so ending a session early means typing a sentence, and the browser's extensions page is blocked while you are locked in. Gives up: it costs money after 3 free sessions ($9.99 a month), it occasionally misjudges a page (a 3-minute Quick Check covers that), and it only works in the browser, so it cannot stop your phone.

Which one should you use?

If you only lose time to autoplay, start with option 1; it is free and may be enough. If you have already tried that and you type the rabbit hole in yourself, or you keep turning your blocker off because it blocked something you needed, you need option 4. If YouTube is not really the problem and it is your phone, none of these help; see the blocker comparison for tools that work beyond the browser.