orbutton
How to use orbutton
Everything you need to build a queue, tune the crossfade, and know what to expect from ads and blocked videos.
Two ways to build a queue
About the "Advanced — API key" field: playlists load automatically through orbutton's own shared connection to YouTube. On rare occasions — if a lot of people are using orbutton at the same moment — that shared daily allowance can run out for the day; orbutton will tell you clearly if this happens. Adding your own free API key removes that shared limit entirely for you, and is also there for anyone who'd simply rather use their own, independent connection.
Getting a free API key takes about two minutes:
- Open Google Cloud Console and create a project (or use an existing one).
- Enable "YouTube Data API v3" for that project.
- Open Credentials, click Create credentials, and choose API key.
- Name the key, then open API restrictions and select YouTube Data API v3 — this locks the key so it can't be used for anything else.
- Save, then copy the key and paste it into orbutton's advanced field.
The free daily quota (10,000 units) is far more than one person needs. Your own key is stored only in your browser's local storage and used only for your own requests, sent directly from your browser to Google — it's never seen by orbutton's own systems.
Paste from more than one source at once New
You're not limited to a single block of links — paste one list, add more links later, or combine several playlists' worth of individual links into the same box. orbutton merges everything into one queue and automatically removes exact duplicates, so pasting the same track twice (easy to do when copying from multiple tabs) never adds it twice. If anything gets removed this way, it says so — e.g. "1 duplicate link removed" — right after loading.
How it works
Paste your links
Either method from above works here — individual links, or a whole playlist link.
https://youtu.be/...
Set your crossfade point
Drag the slider to decide exactly when the next track should start — 50% by default, fully adjustable. Set the fade length too (1–12 seconds) — how long the two tracks overlap once the transition begins.
Next track starts at 50% of current
Hit play
The queue plays straight through with smooth crossfades — shuffle, repeat, drag to reorder, or set a sleep timer anytime.
Playback modes
Repeat all, Repeat one, and normal "up next" playback all share the same safeguard: orbutton never lands on a track it already knows can't be embedded. If every remaining track in the queue turns out to be blocked, playback stops and says so, rather than looping silently forever — see blocked-link detection & replacement below.
Queue control
Now playing track
Channel A · 4:24
Dragged up next
Channel C · 5:12
Up next
Channel B · 3:39
Drag-to-reorder queue
Grab any track in the queue by its drag handle and drop it anywhere else — the change applies instantly, without interrupting whatever is currently playing. Useful for pulling a track up next, or pushing one further back without removing it.
Keyboard shortcuts New
Control playback without reaching for the mouse — handy mid-task or across the room. Shortcuts are disabled while you're typing in a text field, so they never interfere with pasting links or naming a preset.
Tab 1
Paused
One tab at a time New
Open orbutton in a second tab (or accidentally reload it in a new one) and pressing play there automatically pauses every other orbutton tab open in the same browser — no two mixes fighting over the same speakers. Each tab still keeps its own queue and settings; only playback is coordinated.
Presets, export & import
Up to 8 presets, stored in this browser
Save your mix settings as presets New
Dial in a crossfade point and fade length you like, click "+ Save preset", and give it a name. From then on, one click on that chip instantly re-applies both values — no more re-dragging two sliders every time you switch between, say, a fast "party" mix and a slow "background" one. Click the ✕ on a chip to delete it; the oldest preset is dropped automatically once you hit 8.
orbutton-queue-2026-09-11.json
Export & import your whole session New
"Export" asks for a file name, then saves one JSON file with your current queue, crossfade settings, shuffle/repeat mode, volume, and all your presets — on Chrome/Edge/Opera, a real "Save As" dialog lets you also pick the folder; on Firefox/Safari (which don't support that dialog) it saves under your chosen name to your browser's regular downloads location instead. "Import" reads that same kind of file back in and restores everything exactly as it was — useful for moving your setup to another device, or just keeping a backup of a queue you spent time curating. Nothing is sent anywhere; the file never leaves your computer unless you choose to share it yourself.
Ads, blocked videos & replacements
orbutton doesn't remove ads itself. YouTube serves ads according to each video's own settings — the same whether you watch on youtube.com or through an embedded player like this one. A real ad-blocker extension in your browser (uBlock Origin and similar) generally still applies inside the embed too, since it filters by request and by frame, not by which site loaded the video — so it's not that blocking is impossible here specifically. But YouTube has been actively working against ad blockers everywhere, including testing ads baked directly into the video stream itself, which no blocker anywhere can strip. The one option that reliably works every time: a YouTube Premium account signed into this browser.
Why a track gets blocked
A video's uploader — not YouTube itself, and not orbutton — decides whether it can play in an embedded player like this one, on any site. They disable it for all kinds of reasons: a music label restricting embedding to protect ad revenue on their own channel, a video that's region-locked in your country, or simply a setting the uploader never thought about. Whatever the reason, orbutton checks every track's status before it ever tries to play it, so you find out from a badge in the queue — not from a dead silence mid-mix.
Region-locked trackEmbed blocked
Channel B · 3:39
1. Spot it in the queue
A blocked track shows dimmed, with its title struck through and a red "Embed blocked" badge — you see this the moment the queue loads, before you've pressed play once. A "Find replacement" button appears right under it.
Searching for the same song, re-uploaded elsewhere…
Same song · fan upload
Use thisSame song · lyric video
Use this2. Click "Find replacement"
orbutton searches YouTube's own Data API for videos with a matching title and artist that explicitly allow embedding — deliberately excluding official label/VEVO-style channels (the exact channels most likely to have embedding disabled in the first place) in favor of fan uploads, lyric videos, and visualizers, which almost always carry the identical audio.
Same song · lyric video
Channel D · 3:41 · replaced
3. Accept it, or don't
Nothing swaps automatically. Each candidate shows its own title and channel so you can judge it yourself, and clicking "Use this" is the only thing that replaces the blocked entry — leave the suggestions alone and the original stays right where it was, still marked as blocked. If none of the candidates look right, close the panel and the track is simply skipped during playback, same as before this feature existed.
Scope, honestly stated: this only ever touches metadata through YouTube's official Data API — searching titles, reading embeddability status, swapping which video ID is queued next. orbutton never downloads, re-hosts, or extracts audio or video from any source, blocked or not.