While YouTube is one of the biggest social media platforms on the internet, it has had its fair share of controversies surrounding it. From its illegal collection of children’s data to allegedly pushing viewers towards right-wing and more explicit videos, YouTube has had its fair share of concerning allegations levied against it.
This series is focused on ways that you can move away from using Google products for increased data privacy, and what better to start with than Canada’s second most popular website (at the time of writing this post). Given the massive market share of YouTube, there are bound to be countless competitors and each comes with its own set of pros and cons.
The big question to consider if you’re looking for an alternative to YouTube is:
Why do you use YouTube?
Depending on how you answer this question, you may find one alternative platform fits better than another.
I Want To Watch Videos From My Favourite Creators
The reality of the current state of the internet is that most people predominantly consume rather than create. It’s not necessarily wrong if you fall into this bucket, but it is good to acknowledge it as such. If you do find yourself falling into this bucket, a switch away from YouTube may be a bit more difficult.
Because YouTube is as possible as it is, most creators benefit from publishing to the platform, so you’re unlikely to find a good alternative with all of your favourite creators on it. You’ll likely find a handful of alternative websites that have a creator or two you’re interested in, but the main draw to YouTube is just how many creators are on it.
I Want to Show My Own Videos to the World
For the creatives in the audience, there are plenty of alternatives to YouTube for hosting your own videos.
A few things to keep in mind if you go this route:
- YouTube provides “infinite” storage for free because you are the product. If you’re moving away from that site because you don’t want to be the product, expect the “infinite” storage to go away.
- Given the smaller audience size, you’re not likely to “go viral” on other platforms. But given that users uploaded 720,000 hours of content every day in 2025, you’re not likely to go viral on YouTube either.
I Want to Host My Own Videos
Peer-to-peer (P2P) technologies probably deserve a write-up of their own, but that’s way outside the scope of this post, so here’s the quick version. Typically, you upload a video to YouTube and then YouTube makes it available to anyone who comes to their website (barring certain restrictions, privacy settings, etc).
P2P video platforms act more like personal blogs. Typically, you’ll host your own data (in this case, videos) and connect to a network of other video providers. Once you’re connected with another computer, they can view your videos and vice versa. Depending on the technology you’re using, people can still subscribe to your “channel” and you discover new “channels” the same way you would find new blogs: either through searching on the internet or through links from other video providers. The main focus is decentralization: rather than Google being the only gatekeeper to a platform and the ability to share videos, that role is moved to the owner of the machine your video is hosted on (which can be you).
Keep in mind there can be a bit of a learning curve for these technologies.
YouTube Alternatives
DailyMotion
If you really want to get away from YouTube and you’re not a creator, DailyMotion might be the way to go. It has some major corporate channels including Bon Appetit, History, Vanity Fair, and WatchMojo. But you need to be a paid subscriber in order to upload, so you’re not likely to get smaller or independent creators on here anytime soon.
Vimeo
If you’re a creator who cares about high quality uploads, Vimeo might be the way to go. You can start uploading with a free account (up to 1GB of storage), and pricing seems fairly decent to get multiple terabytes of storage (roughly $14/month for a yearly plan that provides 2TB of storage).
PeerTube
This is one of many P2P softwares. There are many networks of existing PeerTube users that you can join and upload your videos to, or you can run PeerTube yourself and become your own node in the network. You can even search a broader network of PeerTube nodes from the official PeerTube software website. Rules and restrictions will vary depending on the platform you’re using.
Other Options
There are countless other options for YouTube alternatives, though some are more fringe than others. There is a whole slew of alternatives that highlight creators who may have been banned from YouTube, typically for violating rules around harassment, hate speech, or other disagreeable things. I’m hesitant to list them for fear of giving them more traffic, but out on the wide internet you can find all sorts of videos on conspiracy theories, Alex Jones uploads, and other “free-thinkers”.