Why I stopped watching YouTube "normally", and what changed

I used to open YouTube for one specific thing — a tutorial, a lecture, a how-to — and somehow surface 45 minutes later having watched four things I never meant to. It wasn't a discipline problem. The homepage feed, the sidebar "up next," and the comments are built to keep you scrolling, not to help you finish what you came for.

A few things changed once I started using a stripped-down version of YouTube that only keeps the search bar:

I actually finish what I opened the tab for. No homepage grid pulling me sideways before I've even typed a search.

No sidebar rabbit holes. Once a video ends, there's no autoplay queue of "recommended" content baiting the next click — I just close the tab.

No comment-section spiral. Easy to forget how much time disappears scrolling comments on a video you were only half-watching anyway.

It's a toggle, not a lock. Some days I want normal YouTube (music, entertainment) — one click switches Focus Mode on or off, so it's not fighting me, it's available when I want it.

Nothing's tracked. Runs entirely client-side — no data collection, since the whole point is attention, not analytics.

It's been genuinely useful for tutorial-watching, lecture-following, and research — basically anything where YouTube is a tool and not a destination. If anyone else has the "opened it for one video, lost the afternoon" problem, this might help. Happy to drop the link if useful.