How to completely disable HTML5 Video playback on Safari

google-chromesafarisafari-extensionsvideo

I am so sick & tired of HTML5 videos, that I just want to completely disable them. I don't want em playing at all. Even if I click on them or whatever.

I found this extension for Chrome, which does the trick. Looking for something like this on Safari

PS: I did try converting this extension, but the resulting extension while appearing to work, is unable to actually block videos

Best Answer

My prev attempt at fixing this with AdGuard failed miserably. However, I just found an option in-built in Safari that solves my problem.

My initial frustrations were relating to HTML5 videos, mainly relating to the fact that they continue to auto-play even when Safari was set to not let them. And so I figured let's just disable them altogether. But maybe that was too extreme of an option. This one is a lot better!

The solution

  1. Enable Safari Debug Menu

Run this in a Terminal window. To disable the menu replace the 1 with a 0

defaults write com.apple.Safari IncludeInternalDebugMenu 1

  1. Restart Safari

  2. Open the Debug Menu, and head over to Media Flags

  3. Enable the Video Needs User Action & Audio Needs User Action

  4. Restart Safari

  5. Now laugh at the puny websites trying their futile attempts to auto-play videos BWAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA

PS: If you are a reddit user, you might just wanna head over to their website and just try it out with these options enabled

Tested on Safari Version 14.0.2 (16610.3.7.1.9)

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