A writer's seven settings tweaks keep YouTube video habits out of YouTube Music mixes and limit how much activity Google keeps.
YouTube Music can play songs you actually like if you change a few settings. Android Police writer Irene Okpanachi says seven tweaks cleaned up her mixes. The biggest fix is keeping what you watch on YouTube from steering what you hear.
YouTube Music runs on the same system as YouTube. Your video history can bleed into your music suggestions. The Home tab adds to the clutter, with over 20 shelves, including Quick picks and a live Listen together station. Many of them had little to do with her taste.
Another option is a separate Google account just for YouTube Music. Tap your profile picture, then the + next to Accounts. On a Premium family plan, the new account needs an invite from the plan manager. It uses one of the plan's five member slots, and families can be switched only once a year.
Autoplay fills the silence with songs the app picks. Each play then counts as your listening, so the app learns from its own guesses. Thumbs-up and thumbs-down buttons give direct feedback instead. A thumbs-up adds a song to your Liked music playlist, which YouTube Music treats as a core part of your taste.
The artist picker is worth redoing every few months. Go to Settings > Recommendations and disable Improve your recommendations to choose artists again. The app asks for five, but the writer suggests tapping every artist you listen to and searching for niche ones. Tap Done to get a Mix to test.
Google's My Activity page lists everything your account records across its services. Visit myactivity.google.com, or use Settings > Privacy & data > Manage watch history in the app. Each entry is labeled YouTube or YouTube Music, so you can see where non-music clutter comes from. Use the trash icon or Delete to remove entries. Auto-delete can go as low as three months, which is the setting she chose.
Restricted mode hides songs the app flags as mature, including tracks with the E badge. Go to Settings > General > Restricted mode. It turns on for your current device only.
If YouTube Music feels off, pause watch history and turn off Autoplay first, then set Google's auto-delete to three months.
A TikTok Shop affiliate says a strong first line, an honest demo and steady posting earned him six figures last year. Here is how it works and what it costs to try.
Read more: How a TikTok creator earns six figures with a 3-second opening lineSudden fan roars usually come from dust or busy background programs. Both are easy to check, and a few minutes of work may quiet your laptop.
Read more: Why your laptop fan suddenly roars, and how to quiet itGoogle's Gemini can now edit a PDF inside the chat, so fixing a travel plan no longer means downloading the file and starting over in another app.
Read more: Gemini can now edit your PDF itinerary without starting over
