YouTube is going to hide the number of dislikes on videos

Google will now hide the number of dislikes on all YouTube videos. The company does this to prevent “targeted dislike attacks and bullying” on the platform. The dislike button itself will remain available.

According to Google, the change will gradually be rolled out to all YouTube users from Wednesday. After the adjustment, the number of dislikes on a YouTube video is only visible to its uploader, and therefore no longer public. Users can continue to dislike videos. That will affect the recommended videos users see, the company said, and dislikes should also function as private feedback for YouTube creators.

Google indicates that the company is aware that some users use the dislike numbers to decide whether or not to watch a video. “We know you may not agree with this decision, but we believe it’s the right thing to do for the platform,” the company wrote.

The change comes as no surprise. Since the end of March, experiments have been going on with hiding dislikes on YouTube videos. The company won’t comment on the results of the earlier experiment, but says that fewer “dislike attacks” were carried out on videos when the number of dislikes was hidden. In such attacks, groups of users leave bad ratings on specific YouTube videos or channels.

According to Google, feedback shows that smaller and starting YouTube channels in particular are victims of this behavior, and the company wants to prevent this in the future. “We want to create an inclusive and respectful environment where creators have the opportunity to succeed and feel safe to express themselves.”