YouTube Comments Held for Review: Why It Happens and How to Clear Them

A viewer says their comment vanished, or Studio shows a Held count you did not expect. Neither is a bug. On your own channel, YouTube parks certain comments in a review queue until you decide, and several settings, some of which you may not remember turning on, decide what goes there. This guide is for the channel owner. If you are a viewer whose comment is not showing on someone else's video, our comments not showing guide covers that side.

Short answer. YouTube holds a comment when your moderation level (Basic, Strict or Hold all), your blocked words, your link setting or its own spam detection flags it. Held comments are not public until you approve them, and they stay in YouTube Studio's Held tab for up to 60 days. Open Studio, choose Community, then the Held tab, and approve, remove or hide each one.

Why YouTube holds a comment for review

Every held comment came from one of these, all documented in YouTube Help:

• Your moderation level. Basic, Strict and Hold all each hold a different share of comments (next section). Source: Learn about comment settings.
• Your blocked words. Comments that "contain or closely match" a blocked word are held, "unless they're from someone on your approved user list." A broad word like "link" or "free" is the usual cause of a full Held tab.
• Links and hashtags. With link holding on, comments containing URLs or hashtags wait for review. Comments from you, your moderators and approved users are not held for links.
• Likely spam. YouTube merged its old "Held for review" and "Likely spam" tabs into one. Comments reported as spam sit at the bottom of the Held tab, labelled "Likely spam" (Manage spam in comments).
• Your moderators. Moderators cannot delete comments; when they act on one from the watch page they hold it for you to decide (Moderate comments). See who can do what with comments.
• Your own automation. A CommentShark rule with the Hold for review action sends matching comments to the same Held tab, so they follow the same rules below.

Basic vs Strict vs Hold all

These are YouTube's four moderation levels, quoted from Learn about comment settings:

• None: "Don't hold any comments."
• Basic: "Hold potentially inappropriate comments." YouTube says these may include spam, self-promotion or gibberish, and that the detection uses AI and may not always be accurate.
• Strict: "Hold a broader range of potentially inappropriate comments." More spam caught, and more genuine comments caught with it.
• Hold all: "Hold all comments." Nothing is public until you approve it.

Which to pick depends on how much review time you have, not on how much you dislike spam. Basic is the sensible default for most channels. Strict suits a video that is drawing a spam wave or a heated topic, for as long as the wave lasts. Hold all only works if someone checks the queue several times a day; otherwise real viewers wait, give up and stop commenting.

You set the level in two places. For new uploads, open YouTube Studio, then Settings, Community moderation, Content controls, and use the hold options under comments on new videos and posts (Manage your channel's moderation settings). For a single video, open Content, select the video, click Show more and change it under Comments and ratings (Choose comment settings). Changing a single video is how you go Strict on one heated upload without touching the rest of the channel.

The 60-day limit

YouTube's wording is that held comments are "Kept in YouTube Studio for up to 60 days" and "Aren't publicly visible, unless you approve them." The same 60 days applies to comments held for blocked words, links and hashtags. Google does not say what happens on day 61, so treat 60 days as your deadline: a held comment you never review is a comment that never goes public. For a spam-heavy channel that is fine; for a channel holding real questions, it means viewers who never got an answer.

How to review and approve held comments

• 1. Sign in to YouTube Studio and select Community in the left menu (Review & reply to comments).
• 2. Open the Held tab. Comments flagged as likely spam are at the bottom.
• 3. For each comment choose Approve to publish it, Remove to delete it, Report for spam or abuse, or Hide user from channel to stop that account for good.
• 4. For a regular whose comments keep getting held, open one of their published comments and choose Always approve comments from this user. Approved users' comments are "automatically published."
• 5. In the YouTube Studio app, tap Community in the bottom menu and use the same actions on the Held tab.

Approving held comments in bulk

YouTube's help pages describe Approve, Remove and Hide as actions on one comment at a time, and they do not document a select-all approve for the Held tab (as of October 2026). The way to approve in bulk is to stop good comments from landing there in the first place, then let the hold do its job on the rest:

• Approve people, not comments. Every regular you add with Always approve is a stream of future comments you never review again.
• Prune your blocked words. Sort the Held tab mentally by cause. If most held comments share one blocked word, that word is too broad: replace it with the phrase spammers actually use. Our blocked words guide shows which terms catch scams without catching fans.
• Step down a level. If Strict holds mostly genuine comments, Basic plus a targeted blocked-words list usually holds less and catches the same spam.
• Leave obvious spam alone. A held spam comment is already invisible. You do not have to remove it; reviewing the genuine ones is the job. Our spam comments guide has a phrase list that keeps the worst of it out of the queue entirely.

Hold less, catch more: rules instead of Hold all

The trade-off in Studio is blunt: catch more spam and you hold more real comments. Rules let you be specific instead. In CommentShark you write a rule in plain words, such as "hold any comment that asks viewers to contact someone on Telegram or WhatsApp," and its Hold for review action sends only those comments to your Held tab, where the 60-day window applies as usual. Everything else stays public under Basic. Rules run on every video, including old uploads, and you can test a rule against real comments before switching it on. See how automated comment moderation works, or read the full setup in how to automatically moderate YouTube comments.

Frequently Asked Questions