Universal Autoplay Preview Video Blocker

WHAT IT DOES

Universal Autoplay Preview Video Blocker scans the page for video elements that autoplay as previews and blocks them from playing automatically. This includes muted autoplay videos, hover-to-play triggers, scroll-into-view triggers, and background videos that start without user interaction. Each blocked video is replaced with a placeholder thumbnail or a play button overlay, allowing you to manually click to play when you want to watch. A floating counter shows how many videos have been blocked on the current page, giving you visibility into how much autoplay content has been suppressed. The script also detects and blocks YouTube and Vimeo embeds that autoplay, adding click-to-play overlays to give you control.

WHERE IT RUNS

This script operates as a userscript within the BotGentz extension on any webpage containing video content, including social media feeds, news sites, video aggregators, e-commerce pages, and blogs. It functions on any modern browser that supports the BotGentz extension, including Chrome, Firefox, Edge, Safari, and Opera. The script runs entirely client-side, modifying video behavior locally without sending any data to external servers.

HOW TO USE

After installation, the script automatically scans the page for autoplay videos and blocks them. Placeholders appear in place of blocked videos with a play button overlay—click to play any video you want to watch. The floating counter shows how many videos have been blocked. Open the panel to customize which types of autoplay to block (muted, hover-to-play, scroll-into-view), toggle the counter display, adjust the counter position, or exclude specific sections using CSS selectors. Use the "Scan & Block Videos" button to manually re-scan the page if new videos are loaded dynamically.

THE MECHANISM THAT MAKES IT WORK

The script uses a multi-layered detection strategy to identify autoplay videos. First, it scans the DOM for video elements and checks attributes (autoplay, data-autoplay) and properties (muted state). Second, it intercepts IntersectionObserver instances that detect when videos scroll into view—a common mechanism for scroll-triggered autoplay. Third, it uses a MutationObserver to detect dynamically loaded videos and block them immediately. For each blocked video, the script creates a placeholder div that preserves the video's dimensions and displays either a poster image or a generated thumbnail. The placeholder captures click events to play the underlying video. For iframe embeds, the script removes autoplay parameters from URLs and adds click-to-play overlays. The blocked count is tracked in memory and displayed in the floating counter, with periodic updates to keep the count accurate.

THE PANEL

The script panel is built using BotGentz's BGPanel framework and provides comprehensive control over the video blocker's behavior. The panel opens as a floating overlay that can be dragged anywhere on your screen, with a clean dark theme matching the tool's aesthetic. It includes a text input for CSS selectors to exclude specific videos from blocking, toggle switches for enabling the blocker, blocking muted videos, hover-to-play, and scroll-into-view, and toggles for the counter and placeholder display. A dropdown menu lets you set the counter's position to top-left, top-right, bottom-left, or bottom-right. Action buttons allow you to scan and block videos, save settings, or reset all settings to defaults. The panel collapses to a small icon when not in use and expands when clicked, remaining accessible but unobtrusive. Press the Escape key at any time to close the panel.

PLEASE NOTE

This script requires the free BotGentz extension to be installed and activated in your browser. The extension is available from the official BotGentz website. The script works by intercepting browser APIs and modifying video behavior, which may occasionally interfere with legitimate video functionality. You can use the exclude selectors field to prevent the script from affecting specific videos. The script cannot block videos that are loaded using custom JavaScript players that don't use standard video elements. Some sites may detect the interception and attempt to re-enable autoplay; the script's MutationObserver will re-block new videos as they appear. No data is collected, stored, or transmitted by this script; all processing is performed locally in your browser.