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YouTube on Safari unusable due to dropped frames

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danieL2k

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Feb 22, 2012
15
2
Hey all,

I'm having a problem with Safari 17.4.1, or actually it's been much, much longer and I'm reaching the end of my tether.
YouTube freezes and freezes and I can't do anything else. All the other browsers I've tried (Chrome, Firefox, Orion, Arc, Vivaldi) don't have the problem. I also see under "Statistics for nerds" that Safari loses a really large number of frames, which is not the case with the browsers mentioned above, at least not to the same extent.

I'm currently using Orion because it's simply the best browser with WebKit, but I'd like to use Safari because of the better energy usage, but I use a lot of YouTube and that's just not possible.

I tried Vinegar (extension) --> no help
Reset NVRAM and SMC --> no help
Tried the feature flags --> no help (and now reset again)
Disabled extensions (Adguard, Noir, PiPifier, Zotero Connect, Reddit Sinkit and 1Password) --> no help; though I'm not using AdGuard on YouTube due to me having YouTube Premium BUT I'm running AdGuard on my Mac (I've bought this as well) and got the DNS filtering activated but Private Relay is off
Cache cleared --> no help
History deleted --> no help
deleted the one entry under "/Library/InternetPlugins" --> no help

Is there anything else I can do?

My MacBook Pro:
13-inch, 2018, Four Thunderbolt 3 Ports
2,7 GHz Quad-Core Intel Core i7
Intel Iris Plus Graphics 655 1536 MB
16 GB 2133 MHz LPDDR3
OS Sonoma 14.4.1 (23E224)
 
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kitKAC

macrumors 6502a
Feb 26, 2022
699
662
I have exactly the same machine as you, and YouTube in Safari is fine for me. Have you tried creating a new profile to test Safari in?
 
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danieL2k

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Feb 22, 2012
15
2
kitKAC said:
I have exactly the same machine as you, and YouTube in Safari is fine for me. Have you tried creating a new profile to test Safari in?
Click to expand...
Not yet. But I will give it a try tomorrow.
What could may cause this profile issue?
 
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Sheepish-Lord

macrumors 68020
Oct 13, 2021
2,220
4,556
You could also try downloading the Safari Tech Preview version. It’s a standalone browser as well so won’t mess up anything on your current Safari.
 
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danieL2k

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Feb 22, 2012
15
2
Sheepish-Lord said:
You could also try downloading the Safari Tech Preview version. It’s a standalone browser as well so won’t mess up anything on your current Safari.
Click to expand...
Will do as well.
is there extensions support on that preview?
 
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danieL2k

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Feb 22, 2012
15
2
kitKAC said:
I have exactly the same machine as you, and YouTube in Safari is fine for me. Have you tried creating a new profile to test Safari in?
Click to expand...
Okay so I did that this morning, and unfortunately no help so far.
After some time, I'm still getting lags.
I asked for help in the German Apple community forums and they adviced me to look up at the console for errors. I get some red and some yellow errors related to Safari but I'm unsure what to do with these errors now.

Maybe some of you got some help on this end?
My next step is to try the Tech Preview version as suggested above.
 
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danieL2k

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Feb 22, 2012
15
2
D

danieL2k

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Feb 22, 2012
15
2
Sheepish-Lord said:
You could also try downloading the Safari Tech Preview version. It’s a standalone browser as well so won’t mess up anything on your current Safari.
Click to expand...
Okay somehow my problems do not occur on this Tech Preview version (so far at least).
So is there anything I can do, to get my “usual“ Safari working like the Tech Preview? Can I reset my Safari or anything like that?
 
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danieL2k

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Feb 22, 2012
15
2
HDFan said:
Does it happen booting into Safe Mode?
Click to expand...
Gonna try now. In Safe Mode everything is slow as hell (I guess this is okay?)
Will watch a video now and come back here after that

EDIT: Right away I get A LOT of dropped frames, but I guess its due to the slow performance:

Bildschirmfoto 2024-04-13 um 12.14.07.png
 
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danieL2k

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Feb 22, 2012
15
2
Okay so I think it does appear in Safe Mode as well. I feel like the picture is stuttering, maybe not as hard as in normal mode, but still stuttering. There are for sure some other strange things im Safe Mode like skipping for example.

Anything else I could try?
 
S

Sheepish-Lord

macrumors 68020
Oct 13, 2021
2,220
4,556
danieL2k said:
Okay somehow my problems do not occur on this Tech Preview version (so far at least).
So is there anything I can do, to get my “usual“ Safari working like the Tech Preview? Can I reset my Safari or anything like that?
Click to expand...
You mentioned early about extensions you had. If the Technology Preview works with no extensions then it could possibly be an issue with ones you have installed on the normal Safari. You can add extensions one by one in Technology Preview to determine which is the offender causing issues then remove that from your normal Safari.
 
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danieL2k

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Feb 22, 2012
15
2
Sheepish-Lord said:
You mentioned early about extensions you had. If the Technology Preview works with no extensions then it could possibly be an issue with ones you have installed on the normal Safari. You can add extensions one by one in Technology Preview to determine which is the offender causing issues then remove that from your normal Safari.
Click to expand...
Okay so I uninstalled ALL extensions, deactivated AdGuard on my Mac and quitted all applications. I even uninstalled some apps, that might interfere with Safari but still: stuttering.

What I found curious is: I can restart Safari and got no trouble with video content for around 15 minutes. After that, it starts to drop frames and the stutter-fest begins…
I wonder if its related to something like caching?
 
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danieL2k

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Feb 22, 2012
15
2
bogdanw said:
You can clear Safari's cache from the Develop menu or with the shortcut ⌥⌘E

(Develop menu - Safari - Settings – Advanced - Show features for web developers https://support.apple.com/guide/safari/ibrw1075/ )

Or you can delete ~/Library/Containers/com.apple.Safari/Data/Library/Caches
https://forums.macrumors.com/thread...istory-for-a-whole-week.2419367/post-32941097
Click to expand...
Although I cannot use the Terminal commands you posted (don't know why) I used the paths you posted to delete them manually.
Will update, after I watched some stuff.
 
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danieL2k

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Feb 22, 2012
15
2
Okay so I tried again, and still no help.
I attached a short screen recording of my problem. This is happening constantly (every 30-60 seconds) and causes about 10-30 framedrops.
I'm really unsure, what is causing this.

 
tarsins

tarsins

macrumors 65816
Sep 15, 2009
1,178
854
Wales
I get this problem on a variety of sites and I too have tried disabling everything to no avail. I've switched to Edge where it's fine but I'd really like to use Safari. I'll be watching this thread in the hope of a fix.
 
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danieL2k

macrumors newbie
Original poster
Feb 22, 2012
15
2
tarsins said:
I get this problem on a variety of sites and I too have tried disabling everything to no avail. I've switched to Edge where it's fine but I'd really like to use Safari. I'll be watching this thread in the hope of a fix.
Click to expand...
Yeah, I feel you. I've switched to Brave for now. We'll see if this will get fixed anytime soon…
 
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H

HDFan

Contributor
Jun 30, 2007
6,644
2,887
On my Mac

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in Safari, Firefox, Chrome
 
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