Short-form video apps like TikTok and YouTube Shorts deliver quick, addictive content designed for endless scrolling. It’s easy to fall into a rabbit hole of 30-second clips—turning a 10-minute break into 30 minutes, an hour, or more.

The long-term effects are serious. Often called “TikTok Brain,” the result can be shorter attention spans and higher anxiety—especially harmful to young, developing minds.

TikTok is avoidable: just don’t download it (or delete it). But YouTube Shorts is trickier. YouTube is far more popular and widely used, especially for seemingly innocent content like music or Shiurim. Shorts appear automatically, can’t be disabled in settings, and often bypass YouTube’s content filtering options—so many include inappropriate material.

A few workarounds exist for YouTube shorts on PCs, but they’re limited and technical. On phones, blocking YouTube Shorts is not possible. In both cases, a proper filter will block Shorts—some filters better than others.

Adults might have the self-control to stop scrolling, but kids often don’t. If children must use YouTube, supervise them closely and install a filter that blocks Shorts completely.