I really hope the answer is “yes,” but gosh-darned if I can find one. The FreeTube app still works as long as my VPN is off, but as for Invidious . . . (also, sorry if this has already been covered earlier).

  • @[email protected]
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    21 hours ago

    Freetube on desktop, NewPipe on smartphone. And I have no problems with VPNs on both devices!

  • @lemming741
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    91 day ago

    My self hosted instance works great

  • @Substance_P
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    51 day ago

    I’ve been trying for weeks. Sometimes, using a random IP address with Proton VPN works for a few hours, but eventually, Freetube (or YouTube) seems to catch on and shuts me down. Gravitywell mentioned a piped instance, which was great but only worked for a minute or two for me. I think the days of being anonymous on YouTube are over—time to move on if privacy is important to you.

  • @[email protected]
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    61 day ago

    I don’t think so, YouTube’s new method for blocking third party clients seems to be difficult to work around. I have the Linux version of the NewPipe app and that seems to be working but I don’t use VPNs, so I don’t know if that would work for you.

      • Random Dent
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        41 day ago

        It stopped working for me recently. It’ll play the first 5 seconds or so of the video and then just freeze up.

  • Alas Poor ErinaceusOP
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    123 hours ago

    That reminds me, I think I remember reading on the FreeTube page that they recommended using a VPN with it (this was before the current issues with Mullvad); anyone know why? Are FreeTube users in any danger of being hunted down by Sundar Pichai & co.?

      • Koantig
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        13 hours ago

        @Nonbinary_Sahrah
        My recent experience: YouTube keeps on asking me to sign on (I never do) if I’m on the vpn. I’m using mullvad.

        It sometimes works if I change location and always works if I turn off the vpn.

        ( I don’t know if it’s specific to mullvad though)
        @zdhzm2pgp

  • comfy
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    41 day ago

    I still use Invidious and Piped for searches and looking at comments, but they are currently broken (as far as I’ve seen).

  • @[email protected]
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    21 day ago

    I’d like to know if any of these frontends work with Mullvad VPN, because all the Mullvad servers I’ve tried have been blocked. Even on youtube.com I’m getting throttled to the point where all videos are 360p. Ridiculous, but I’m not turning my VPN off just for YouTube videos.

    • Alas Poor ErinaceusOP
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      11 day ago

      Yeah, same here! I have to turn off Mullvad when watching FreeTube which is definitely annoying.

      • @[email protected]
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        31 day ago

        Yeah, I was also using FreeTube when Mullvad got blocked. Mullvad’s South African servers worked for me for a while but they’re now blocked too, and I’ve tried a bunch of countries and all blocked. Annoyingly even yt-dlp is blocked with Mullvad on now, so I can’t even use that to watch YouTube.

  • A
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    41 day ago

    @[email protected] same here. I stopped fighting via invidious and sadly I’m stuck with freetube, which is great, but I’d prefer a server side alternative