Hulu is great at keeping track of what you have watched and what you haven’t. Sometimes, it gets so aggressive to the extent of preventing you from repeating a movie or episode you’ve already watched before.
Whenever you try re-watching, it will start the episode at the end, the countdown to the next episode, and the next one from the end – if you have watched that episode too.
The algorithm thinks it saves you the pain of going through an episode you’ve already watched and instead tries fast-forwarding you until you get to something you haven’t viewed yet.
Clear Your Watch History
If this happens in series or movies, you have watched and want to repeat it. You can wipe the slate by clearing your watch history. This will make Hulu forget you’ve already watched them before, and it will let you experience your favorite show afresh.
- Sign into your Roku account on a web browser
- Navigate to the Private Settings menu
- After going past the California Privacy Rights, select manage activity
- Select Watch history
- Select the series, movie or episode whose history you want to clear#Click the ‘clear selected’ option to complete the process
If your watch history caused the issue, your series episodes or movie should play from the start.
Episodes I Have Never Watched Play from the End
In case the problem persists after clearing history, or you are confident it is happening on episodes you have never watched before. You could be dealing with corrupted watch history or a glitch in the app.
ProTip: Confirm that somebody else hasn’t watched the episodes you are attempting to watch on your profile before
A good way to narrow down the problem is trying watching the same episode using the online player via your browser.
- Navigate to the Hulu online page and log into your account
- Access the episode you want to play and see if it starts from the end
If it doesn’t start from the end when on the web player, your watch history isn’t the problem. The app that forces it to start from the end is the problem.
Clear Data on the Errand Hulu App
After narrowing it down to a problematic Hulu app, you can try salvaging it by clearing its cache and data. The procedure will vary depending on your platform. The general approach involves:
- Opening the apps list
- Locating Hulu and selecting it
- Looking for data, cache or storage options
- Selecting the clear data option
Alternatively, you could start on a clean slate by uninstalling and reinstalling the Hulu app. This will ensure you get the latest app and get rid of any corrupted cached data that could have been the root of your problem.
Bottom Line
Your Hulu episodes usually start from the end or even in the middle, based on your watch history. The best way to reset and have a given series or movie start from the very beginning is by clearing your watch history.