Does your YouTube algorithm feel kind ofstuck? I know Ive been theregetting recommendations about things Im trying to think less about. Its too easy to click, which in turn teaches YouTube youre interested in that topic, which means you see more recommendations like that. Its an endless cyle.Thats why, if you want to stop YouTube from consuming your life, you need to take control of the algorithm. Weve talked about how to reset the Instagram algorithm; heres how to do the same thing with YouTube.Delete everything from your YouTube historyTo get started, head to myactivity.google.com. From here you can delete everything youve done on Google productsthings youve searched for, the websites you visited in Chrome, the places you went to on devices with Google Maps installed, and all of the YouTube videos youve watched.You can filter down to see only your YouTube videos by clicking YouTube History then clicking Manager History. From here you can manually delete any videos that youd rather not have influencing your YouTube algorithmwe outlined how in our article about how to find, edit and clear out your YouTube history. Anything you delete will stop affecting your YouTube algorithm. Theres even a search tool, meaning you can filter down to only videos that mention particular topics. This is great if you want to be surgical about the topics you dont want to see anymore: just search for something and delete the videos youre no longer interested in.You can also delete everything, thus completely resetting your YouTube algorithm. To do this click the Delete button, then click Delete all time.Screenshot: YouTube You will be asked to confirm, after which all of your YouTube watch history will be deleted. Head back to YouTube and youll see that there are no videos on the homepage. To find something to watch youll have to use search or head to the subscriptions page instead.Screenshot: YouTube Your homepage will repopulate as you watch videos. Note that your algorithm will still be affected by your subscriptions, your Chrome history, and any other information Google still has about you.If youd prefer that your YouTube homepage stay blank thats possible: just head back to myactivity.google.com. From here you can turn off all YouTube history.Screenshot: YouTube Do that and YouTube will stop tracking which videos youve watched going forward and YouTubes homepage will remain blank so long as youre logged into your Google account.Freetube stops Google from tracking you entirelyScreenshot: Freetube Want to avoid Google tracking you altogether? Look into Freetube, a free and open source application built around the idea of privacy. This application is available for Linux, macOS, and Windows computers. It stores your watch history on your computer, not in the cloud, meaning you can keep track of what youve watched without allowing Google to.Theres a potential downside, though: Freetube doesnt support ads. If you want ads to show up multiple times in every video you watch, dont use Freetube. Jokes aside, there are other great features here, from the ability to turn off comments to turning off recommended videos entirely. Check out our full writeup of Freetube for more information.