Recommendations On Twitch
When you visit Twitch, we make recommendations to help you discover new communities and content we think you may like. This article goes over our approach for making content and creator recommendations and provides information on how you can influence them.
Front-Page Carousel
At the top of Twitch’s homepage, visitors will find our Front-Page Carousel, which features a number of live channels. The carousel displays both content curated by Twitch staff and content selected programmatically. The carousel may highlight particular segments of our content creators, special events, or content sponsored by our advertisers. Content in the carousel varies by region to account for geographic differences in creators and their content, such as languages spoken.
*Front-Page Shelves
*Immediately below the carousel, you will find a number of different scrollable horizontal lists of content, which Twitch refers to as “shelves.” We will show you shelves with channels and categories that we think you may like, and we may also show you shelves curated by Twitch staff. Shelves, shelf order, and channels within the shelves are selected based on your device, engagement with Twitch, language, login state, and region. They are also based on your watch history if you have visited Twitch before, and on your age if you are logged in. For all Twitch shelves, and for all the left navigation, browse page, and search bar discussed below, live channels are more frequently given higher priority than non-live channels.
*Left Navigation Bar
*To the left of the carousel and shelves, Twitch users see the “left navigation” bar. There, if you are logged in and stories are available from channels you follow, you will see an icon you can click to view stories. Below that, you will see a list of the channels you follow, with live channels streaming sponsored content via Twitch sponsorships listed first, followed by other live channels, and then offline channels in order of the number of new videos available. Regardless of whether you are logged in, you will also see a list of recommended channels and may also see other recommended categories. These are selected based on your device, engagement with Twitch, language, login state, and region. They are also based on your watch history if you have visited Twitch before, and on your age if you are logged in. When you are on a channel page, the left navigation bar will also display a list of channels also watched by viewers of the channel you are currently watching.
*Browse Page
*From the Twitch homepage or any channel page, you may click the “Browse” button at the top left of the screen to find additional content. On Twitch’s Browse page, you can search for content either by category or tag (short descriptors of the creator or their content), or scroll through a directory of categories or live channels, which you may sort by the number of viewers or by Twitch’s recommendations. Our recommendations are once again based on your device, engagement with Twitch, language, login state, and region. They are also based on your watch history if you have visited Twitch before, and on your age if you are logged in.
*Search Bar
*From the Twitch homepage or any channel page, you may also search for content in the search bar in the top middle of the screen. When you begin to type a word, you will see Twitch’s search suggestions, which are suggested search terms based on direct matches for the word being typed and the popularity of the category or channel, with live content always listed first. If you pick a search suggestion, you will go directly to the category or channel suggested. If you elect to go to the search results page, instead of picking a search suggestion, the search results you see will be divided into channels, categories, and past videos, and they will be ordered based on live channels, popularity, and search query matches.
Notifications
From the Twitch homepage or any channel page, if you are logged in, you will see a small mailbox icon in the top right corner of the screen. Clicking this icon will open your “Notifications” inbox, which may include temporary onsite alerts for live channels, categories, clips, and VODs we recommend to you based on your age, device, engagement with Twitch, language, region, watch history. In addition, we may also deliver these onsite alert recommendations as notifications within the Twitch mobile apps, as device push notifications, or email notifications. For information about how to manage or disable these notifications in your Account Settings, please see this Help Article.
*Mobile Content Feed
*Twitch’s mobile apps also include a content feed home tab with two separate scrollable vertical feeds, one for live content and one for clips. Within these two feeds, we will show you content from popular live channels, categories, and clips, as well as recommended content based on your device, engagement with Twitch, language, login state, and region. They are also based on your watch history if you have visited Twitch before, and on your age if you are logged in. If you are logged in, the scrollable content within the feed is also selected based on your age. In the clips feed, you have the option to click on a like or dislike button, represented by a “Thumbs Up” or “Thumbs Down” icon respectively. Clicking “Thumbs Up” will result in the feed featuring more content from the channel you liked, and clicking “Thumbs Down” will result in the feed not showing content from the channel you have disliked for a period of time. For more information on the mobile apps’ content feed, please see this Help Article.
*How to Control What You See on Twitch
*As our recommendation systems play an important role in helping creators grow and enabling viewers to discover content they enjoy, Twitch gives logged-in users the ability to control their experiences. After logging in, you can remove channels, categories, and other recommended items from shelves and mobile content feeds. To do so, you can click the three vertical dots next to any of these recommended items and then click “Not Interested.” This prevents that item from ever being recommended to you again. If you change your mind, you can remove this restriction in your Account Settings. Additionally, if you choose to filter out streams that are labeled with certain Content Classification Labels, our systems will not recommend those streams to you. For more information on how to remove recommendations you are not interested in, please see this Help Article.
*Keeping Twitch Safe
*Our recommendation systems are designed with focus on your safety, so we may remove content that we determine has violated Twitch’s Community Guidelines or Terms of Service.
If you believe any channel violates our Community Guidelines or Terms of Service, you can report the channel to us by clicking on the three vertical dots next to any channel, clicking “Report”, and then following the prompts. You may also block other channels/users that you do not want to see. When one user blocks another user, neither user’s channel will ever be recommended to the other user. For more information on how we promote safety and moderate content on Twitch, please see our Safety at Twitch page.