Vance gives you an audio-only option, which is nice.

NewPipe also has an audio-only option. Unlike YouTube Vanced (a mod of the original YouTube app), NewPipe is open source and supports video downloading. I think the main advantages of Vanced over NewPipe are the SponsorBlock integration and the ability to log in to a Google account (if that's what you're looking for).

I've been very happy with this fork of newpipe that has sponsorblock built-in (it's been kept up to date with upstream so far): https://github.com/polymorphicshade/NewPipe

It started with this rejected PR: https://github.com/TeamNewPipe/NewPipe/pull/3205

The sponsorblock faith is also available through fdroid

How do you play Youtube clips audio-only with NewPipe?

On the video view, the "Background" button with the headphones icon plays the audio only. You can also hold the button to add the clip to your queue.

I use Firefox for YouTube with the following add-ons:

1. uBlock Origin 2. Video Background Play Fix add-on

This allows me to use YouTube as a background playback music player.

I tried both, Firefox with ublock and Video Background Play Fix extensions (as someone else pointed out too) is great. But I ended up using NewPipe because I feel it's has a better user experience than the mobile version of the YouTube website (playlist management, audio only, downloading, UI) and it's Open Source.

I still use the Firefox option if newpipe has issues fetching the video (which didn't happened to me for a long time).

It's a preference thing, many options are great.

You can click share on a Youtube video on Firefox and you'll get the option to send it to New Pipe. My only gripe with New Pipe is that it breaks some times and it doesn't have Youtube's recommendations.

Newpipe is a better option.

Or Brave.