YouTube Revives ‘Sort by Oldest’ Option on YouTube Channels

YouTube is giving users a time machine of their own from a certain point of view.

The popular video-sharing platform recently revived its "Sort by Oldest" option in a new form after removing it from its website and app more than a year ago.

YouTube reportedly removed the sort option for undisclosed reasons; it simply deprecated it from its website and app, requiring users to scroll down manually to view a channel's oldest video.

YouTube Oldest Sort Option Details

YouTube is one of the most popular video-sharing platforms in the world for a good reason: it was the first to popularize easy uploading and sharing in 2005, per Make Use Of. Since then, many people and (eventually) content creators flocked to YouTube to share their videos and content on its platform for friends, family, fans, and the public to see.

Many of the popular content creators on YoutTube started their careers in the late 2000s and early 2010s, such as Pewdiepie, VanossGaming, and Markiplier, who have been uploading videos on the platform consistently since they first started - having videos dating from that period isn't strange.

What is strange, however, is the fact YouTube removed the "Sort by Oldest" option from its sort menu for undisclosed reasons. However, that changed on June 21.

they added the oldest tab back!
by u/millie1014 in youtube

YouTube has restored the "Sort by Oldest" option in the form of an "Oldest" sort button with the other two sorting options, per Android Police, which first spotted and reported the new feature. The button is present on YouTube's website and mobile app for Android and iOS.

According to the publication, a few Reddit users spotted the feature and reported it to the r/youtube subreddit, though others commented that they couldn't see it on their devices or other YouTube channels. This absence could mean that Google, YouTube's parent company, is still testing it or is having a slow server-side rollout.

YouTube has yet to confirm either. Regardless, those who do have the new sort button can confirm it is working as intended - long-time fans of some of YouTube's biggest content creators can watch their oldest videos now with the help of the newly added "Oldest" sort button.

Why Did YouTube Remove The "Sort By Oldest" Option?

Why YouTube removed its "Sort by Oldeat" option is still a mystery - the company first claimed that the option's removal was due to a temporary bug. However, the company officially revealed in a YouTube video from April 2022 that it intentionally removed the option from the start.

This removal meant that people would have to scroll through a channel's entire video feed, which may take some time to do if a content creator was diligent in making content regularly and frequently.

As a result, fans of long-time YouTube content creators have to manually scroll down to see their favorite content creator's video from the early 2010s - a daunting and sometimes impossible task, considering that YouTube's app stops loading new content after a few scrolls.