YouTube Launches 2025 Personalized Recap Feature

YouTube launched its first comprehensive year-end recap feature for the main platform on Monday, December 2, 2025, alongside annual trending lists that capture the most popular videos, creators, songs, and podcasts watched by users in the United States throughout the year.

The new tool, called YouTube Recap, provides a personalized summary of a user's viewing and listening habits over the past 12 months, drawing from their watch history to generate up to 12 illustrated cards. These cards spotlight top channels, emerging interests, shifts in viewing patterns, and even an assigned "personality type" based on content preferences, such as the Sunshiner, Wonder Seeker, Connector, Philosopher, or Dreamer. For users who consumed significant music, the recap incorporates top artists, songs, genres, and podcasts, with an option to explore deeper details in the separate YouTube Music app if they logged at least 10 hours there.

Inspired by similar end-of-year summaries from platforms like Spotify, YouTube Recap marks an expansion from the music-specific version that has been available for the past three years and a gaming-focused one introduced in 2024. The feature, available only to users...