How to whitelist YouTube playlists
Approve entire YouTube playlists at once so your child can watch all videos in the playlist without individual channel approval.
Coming Soon: Playlist whitelisting is currently in development. The backend is ready, but the parent app UI is not yet live. You can join the waitlist from the Parents' App to be notified when it launches.
What is playlist whitelisting?
Playlist whitelisting lets you approve a full YouTube playlist instead of adding channels one by one. When you whitelist a playlist:
- All videos in that playlist are automatically approved for your child
- Videos from any channel in the playlist can be watched, even if the channel itself isn't whitelisted
- Only public and unlisted playlists are supported — private playlists cannot be added
This is especially useful for curated educational playlists, school assignments, or topic-based collections.
Plan limits
Playlist whitelisting is available on paid plans:
| Plan | Playlists per child |
|---|---|
| Free | Not available |
| Basic | Up to 3 |
| Premium | Up to 10 |
How to add a playlist
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Open the Parents' App at app.whitelist.video (opens in a new tab)
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Tap the Playlists card on your child's dashboard
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Tap Add Playlist
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Paste a YouTube playlist URL
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The app validates the playlist and shows a preview (name, owner, video count, visibility)
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Confirm to add — all videos in the playlist are whitelisted immediately
Key features
Bulk approve videos
Paste a YouTube playlist URL to whitelist all videos in the playlist at once. This saves time compared to approving channels individually.
Manual sync
Playlist video lists do not update automatically. To pick up new videos added to a playlist by its creator, open the playlist in the app and tap Sync. This re-fetches the latest video list from YouTube.
No automatic sync: You must manually sync each playlist to pick up new videos. There is no background auto-sync.
Playlist removal detection
When you sync a playlist, if the original playlist has been deleted by its owner on YouTube, it will be automatically removed from your whitelist and you'll be notified.
How playlists work with other settings
- Blacklisted channels take priority — if a channel is blacklisted, its videos won't play even if they're in a whitelisted playlist
- Blacklisted keywords take priority — even if a video is in a whitelisted playlist, it will be blocked if its title contains a blocked keyword
- Whitelisted channels are unaffected — if a channel is already approved, playlist whitelisting doesn't change anything
- Private playlists are not supported — you'll see an error asking you to change the playlist to Public or Unlisted on YouTube
Limitations
- Only public and unlisted playlists can be added
- No automatic sync — you must manually refresh to pick up new videos
- Maximum ~200 videos per playlist (YouTube's own limit)
- Empty playlists cannot be added