Invidious vs Piped. Which is better?

I use a FF extension that routes videos to mpv from the context menu.

For my phone, I use Vanced

For my Android TV, I use Smarttube.

19

Extension name?

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- https://github.com/woodruffw/ff2mpv
  
  Note: very dependent on a recent yt-dlp on your system. Install it manually using yt-dlp from their website and drop it into your path unless you use Arch or something bleeding edge.
  
  3

I was an Invidious user until I found out about Libretube, and the fact that on Libretube and even on a Piped website you can login to get your subs from other instances. That is crazy useful.

So I am full Piped for now.

15

Do you get issues like crashes and videos not playing? I've been using libretube for quite some time until is just could not open a single video without crashing. I switched back to newpipe for now.

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- There was a momentary bug, but it was fixed quickly. I recommend not using the F-droid repo, because new releases take days and days to arrive, rather use Izzy-on-droid if possible.
  
  4
There's Clipious for Invidious on Android:

https://github.com/lamarios/clipious

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I use Invidious because it does not require JavaScript.

Also, does piped always proxy the data? Some Invidious instances have the option but I have never seen it on pioed instances.

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Piped always proxies. That's also why it's really unreliable every now and then. Google has already blocked some proxy servers

5

After trying both, I've settled on Invidious. I prefer the UI, it feels more snappy than Piped. Plus, with Piped I had this problem with longer videos where it'd just stop playing somewhere in the middle. Might be fixed by now though.

10

Haven’t had the best luck directly using invidious it’s very slow, however I’ve found free tube works really well, it allows u to store ur subscriptions and data on ur device and you can also route your free tube traffic thru an invidious server!

10

How do these work?

Well, Piped doesn't (or at least I've never bothered to wait till it eventually loads).

9

You might need to switch to a smaller instance.

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- Oh really... This is good to know thank you! I thought it was just a bit shit.
  
  11

Personally I prefer Invidious for it's more basic, web-2.0 style UI

8

At this point both are being targeted by youtube and they will just keep rate limiting big public instances the more popular they get. I plan to spin up my own invidious instance sinxe i have the hardware and just plug freetube into it. Ill report back with some info on the reliability

7

So if you have the ability to spin up a docker container you can have a private invidious that is faster than youtube on a nornal browser and more reliable than a public piped/invidious. Ive set it as default instance for all of my desktops that have freetube app.

Also just found out about grayjay for android which is a well made multi platform app and the fact its hosted on gitlab vs github is much appreciated. This means less chance of censorship considering micro$haft owns github

2

Does anyone know if there is an extension which would mark the video as watched on youtube without actually watching it? So that you could still take advantage of youtubes front page.

It's possible to hover over the thumbnail and move the playhead of the mini player a few seconds before the end of the video, and that will count as if you watched the video, but it's slow and not convenient to do.

5

It literally just came out, but grayjay is already feeling better than both piped and invidious in my experience.

5

Link to an instance please

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- It's not an instance. It's an app. https://grayjay.app
  
  7

I was using Invidious but I'm switching to Grayjay

4

I did setup auto redirect on firefox to invidious (yewtu.be) and it works well enough. I will just change redirect when it stops working. No need to be perfectionslist, just make it seamless and voila, no ads or recomendations :)

4

How does one go about doing this?

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- Desktop: LibRedirect browser extension.
  
  Android: Install an app that can open YT links (like LibreTube), and set it as default handler for YT links in the settings. Alternatively Firefox Beta can use regular browser extensions, so LibRedirect should work there as well.
  
  iPhone: No idea.
  
  4

Piped uses less CPU on client playback and features like dash actually work as opposed to invidious. But I'm glad creating a piped instance on docker is complicated because I like the simplicity of invidious' UI.

4

Invidious because it actually works on my homelab. Couldn't get piped to work and their docs are terrible

3

On the phone I'm using Libretube, but I'm going to try out Grayjay that just came out. On PC, I usually use FreeTube.
Both invidious and piped are solid solutions if you'd asked me.

3

I've self-hosted my own single-user Piped instance for about a year. However, I sometimes encounter problems with video loading times, and some subscriptions don't display new publications until I manually visit the channel. The main reason I chose Piped was because it had LibreTube for Android, allowing me to sync my subscriptions between mobile and desktop.

Recently, I've been testing Invidious and I'm liking it. I discovered that using it on Android as a web app is quite efficient, especially in combination with UntrackMe to automatically open YouTube links in my Invidious instance. Additionally, there's Clipious, an Android app similar to LibreTube but with an Invidious backend. Although it's early in its development, it performs well.

I'm still weighing my options, but I find Invidious to be more stable in terms of loading times and subscription feed updates.

2

I like the idea of Piped, because I could use it with LibreTube and have same subscriptions on different devices. But since Piped doesn't work at all for me for the past week, I've switched to FreeTube. It works with no issues.

2

Piped looks better and have more features, than Invidious, but 2nd works faster somehow. Maybe ISP-related stuff, actually.

2

I use both, but I like Invidious more, especially for posting things on Lemmy.

2

I've started using Piped recently but I'm not too sure about it..

I used to watch a lot of random documentaries without subscribing on regular Youtube, but with Piped I find I actively have to search for something so I don't come across new smaller creators like I did on the homepage.

2

Also why can I have a normal Trending tab but not one based on my subscriptions and views?

1

Piped is better for privacy because it proxies everything through the Piped server, with Invidious you still leak your IP to Google. I also prefer the UI of the Piped web client.

2

I haven't used piped tbh, but Invidious serves me well.

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Permanently Deleted

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Piped

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- Now, really, in my experience I had less problems with Piped than with Invidious
  
  1

Invidious caps at 720 but it’s more stable than piped for me.

1