🐞Config options crashes the extension

[kauderk]

Concise Description

The video won't play. Sometimes I get it to play for a few seconds after reloading the browser but still-- it keeps on crashing.
I know is my settings configuration, because I tested it on a blank profile.

Version 4.2026

Brave Browser version

Brave 1.89.132 Chromium: 147.0.7727.56 (Official Build) (64-bit)
Revision d491a927d068805831350ec9d7e5afda454e83ce
OS Windows 11 Version 25H2 (Build 26200.8037)
JavaScript V8 14.7.173.16
User Agent Mozilla/5.0 (Windows NT 10.0; Win64; x64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/147.0.0.0 Safari/537.36

Browser/s

Brave

Other Browser:

No response

'Steps to reproduce' - Which of our features is required for the bug to happen?

import improvedtube.json

Since when?

first time using trying the extension

Does the bug still happen when you log out of YouTube?

Yes

..No? Then please paste your yt.config_.EXPERIMENT_FLAGS. Twice (With the error & Without)

No response

Are any errors or related log-messages shown in the Browser-Console? (F12)

No response

Tested as the only active extension? (incognito mode or another browser users):

Yes

Expected preferred behavior:

No response

ImprovedTube Version

4.2026

Your Settings (From the Extension's ⋮-Hamburger menu > Settings > Backup & reset > Export settings)

improvedtube.json

{
    "ambient_lighting": false,
    "blocklist_activate": false,
    "blocklist_dislike_trigger": false,
    "collapse_of_subscription_sections": false,
    "comments_sidebar": true,
    "comments_sidebar_scrollbars": true,
    "comments_sidebar_simple": true,
    "compactSpacing": true,
    "cursorLighting": false,
    "day_of_week": true,
    "description": "sidebar",
    "disable_likes_animation": true,
    "disable_thumbnail_playback": true,
    "embeddedHidePauseOverlay": true,
    "embeddedHideYoutubeLogo": true,
    "hide_animated_thumbnails": false,
    "hide_banner_ads": true,
    "hide_clip_button": "hidden",
    "hide_download_button": "hidden",
    "hide_merch_shelf": true,
    "hide_playlist": true,
    "hide_report_button": "hidden",
    "hide_share_button": "hidden",
    "hide_shorts_remixing": true,
    "hide_sponsored_videos_home": true,
    "hide_suggested_action": true,
    "hide_thanks_button": "hidden",
    "hide_thumbnail_icon": true,
    "hide_thumbnail_overlay": true,
    "hide_watch_later": true,
    "hide_watched_videos": true,
    "improvedtube_youtube_icon": "header_right",
    "join": "hidden",
    "lastDarkTheme": "black",
    "lastLightTheme": "default",
    "likes": "normal",
    "livechat": "hidden",
    "only_one_player_instance_playing": false,
    "player_60fps": false,
    "player_auto_cinema_mode": true,
    "player_auto_hide_cinema_mode_when_paused": true,
    "player_autopause_when_switching_tabs": true,
    "player_cinema_mode_button": true,
    "popup_ad": true,
    "popup_window_buttons": true,
    "prevent_shorts_autoloop": true,
    "purchase": "hidden",
    "related_videos": "hidden",
    "remove_history_shorts": false,
    "remove_home_page_shorts": true,
    "remove_playables": true,
    "remove_related_search_results": true,
    "remove_shorts_reel_search_results": true,
    "remove_subscriptions_most_relevant": true,
    "remove_subscriptions_shorts": true,
    "remove_trending_shorts": true,
    "shorts_auto_scroll": true,
    "sticky_navigation": false,
    "subscribe": "hidden",
    "theme": "black",
    "track_watched_videos": false,
    "transcript": true,
    "youtube_home_page": "/feed/subscriptions"
}


### Your YouTube-Document

_No response_

### OS / Device:

_No response_

[lui62233]

Hey there! I've been digging into your report and the settings file you attached. It looks like the issue is specifically tied to your custom configuration, as you mentioned it works on a blank profile.

Looking at your improvedtube.json, I noticed you have a very high number of 'hide' options enabled (like hide_playlist, hide_related_videos, hide_share_button, etc.) alongside comments_sidebar: true. In some versions of the extension, overlapping these layout-altering settings can cause the DOM injection to fail or trigger a script error that hangs the video player's initialization.

Suggested Reproduction/Test:

1. Go to Settings > Backup & reset.
2. Reset to default settings.
3. Enable these one by one:
   • comments_sidebar
   • hide_related_videos
   • hide_playlist
4. Check if the video starts crashing after a specific combination.

**Root Cause Hypothesis:** It seems like a race condition where the script attempts to move elements (like the comments to the sidebar) while other 'hide' rules are removing the parent containers from the DOM, leading to a null reference error that crashes the playback loop.

If you can pinpoint which specific toggle triggers the crash, it'll help the devs fix the priority of these operations!

[snakefood3232]

The config import crashes the extension on Brave. I'd handle this by debugging the settings parser for the incomplete JSON in the provided file. Can have a PR up in a few hours—I've fixed similar extension config parsing in production before.

[ImprovedTube]

@kauderk to find the reason, you can see F12 for browser console errors (which we may move up in the order of the bug report template).
You can disable player features one by one in your list (top right: "my active features")

@lui62233 i strike through what appears to be AI Hallucinations, harming volunteer productivity. Disclosure of the author of each sentence is advised.