Show HN: I made a YouTube search form with advanced filters

Original Article ↗ Hacker News Discussion ↗

A small web tool that exposes YouTube’s hidden search operators through a simple form has tapped into broad frustration with how hard it has become to find specific videos on the platform. Many users describe YouTube search as increasingly optimized for engagement rather than relevance — pushing Shorts, recommendations, and “people also watched” content while burying exact matches, older uploads, and subscription feeds. Others point to browser extensions, RSS, alternative frontends, and even external search engines as workarounds, underscoring both the demand for finer-grained filters (dates, duration, language, shorts exclusion) and the sense that core search quality has declined over time.

Scope of the Tool

  • The site is essentially a UI for YouTube’s “hidden” search operators (e.g., date constraints) and standard filters.
  • Supporters see value in surfacing these options and avoiding Shorts and “people also watched” slop in results.
  • Critics argue it’s just URL/query-string generation that YouTube already supports and call it redundant or trivial.
  • Some question the lack of source code and dismiss it as low-value or “vaporware.”

General Dissatisfaction with YouTube Search

  • Many comments say YouTube search has deteriorated:
    • Returns 2–7 relevant results, then switches to generic recommendations, Shorts, “people also watched,” “previously watched,” etc.
    • Often fails to find specific videos even with exact titles or quotes.
    • Search within watch history is described as especially bad.
  • Others say search works fine for their use cases (trailers, common tutorials, familiar channels) and don’t see the problem.

Removed / Hidden Features and Operators

  • Loss of “sort by upload date” in UI and API is widely lamented; users see this as the final blow to usable search.
  • Date operators (before:, after:) still work but are reported as inconsistent, especially for “current events” queries.
  • Some users note that quotes and other advanced operators (on YouTube and Google) are now often ignored or overridden.
  • Users share CSS/uBlock rules and extensions to strip out “related to your search,” “for you,” Shorts, etc.

Subscriptions and Discovery

  • Subscriptions feed is described as “enshittified”: new “relevant/priority” rows, Shorts, and mixed ordering break pure chronological viewing.
  • Various workarounds are mentioned: browser extensions to restore chronological feeds and hide Shorts, RSS feeds per channel, external sites that rebuild subscription feeds, and CLI tools using the subscriptions URL.

Third‑Party Tools & Alternatives

  • Multiple extensions and apps are cited to:
    • Expose hidden filters, block ads/sponsors, hide recommendations, and fix search.
    • Provide frontends (FreeTube, NewPipe, others) or local archives (Tube Archivist, yt-dlp).
  • Reliability of these tools is mixed; some are subject to YouTube’s ongoing changes.

Broader Critique of Google / YouTube

  • Many see this as part of wider “enshittification”: engagement and recommendation metrics trump relevance and user intent.
  • Comparisons are drawn to degraded search in Google, Gmail, Amazon, and streaming services.
  • A minority argues the deeper cause is content being optimized for browse/viral traffic rather than search intent; others counter that search itself is now deliberately hostile.

Desired Missing Features

  • Frequently requested but (apparently) unavailable capabilities:
    • Filter by video language or subtitle language.
    • More granular duration and quality (e.g., specific minutes, 60fps, >X minutes).
    • Robust search within a channel (especially on mobile).
    • Search within transcripts, liked/watched history, and better ways to exclude spammy titles (e.g., with emojis).