World's biggest porn site announces 'difficult decision' as millions are set to be locked out from February
There's trouble on 'the Hub', as one of the internet's most-visited sites confirms it's making further changes to how it's used. There were plenty of news stories that grabbed headlines in 2025, but in the adult entertainment industry, most of the airtime was taken up by Pornhub and the many bans it's faced around the globe.
The USA has banned Pornhub in over a third of its states, there's been trouble in France, as well as strife in Italy, and the United Kingdom has folded to third-party verification at the hands of the Online Safety Act 2023.
Despite the BBC reporting that Pornhub is still the biggest UK porn site, the X-rated giant claims user numbers have been plummeting as they refuse to hand over information or simply can't be bothered with the extra steps.
While Pornhub has complied with new laws, parent company Aylo has announced that it's made the 'difficult decision' regarding future access for new users.
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The United Kingdom has continued to clamp down on what materials we view online, with plans to reclassify 'choking' pornography so that it carries the same punishment as content that involves minors and terrorism.
Referring to the 'failure' of the Online Safety Act, Alex Kekesi, Aylo Head of Community and Brand, said: "Our sites, which host legal and regulated porn, will no longer be available in the UK to new users, but thousands of irresponsible porn sites will still be easy to access."
She reiterated that Pornhub complied with the OSA "because we wanted to believe that a determined and prepared regulator in Ofcom could take poor legislation and manage to enforce compliance in a meaningful way."
However, it's now said that this is unsustainable as experience from Pornhub and other sites under the Aylo umbrella "strongly suggests that the OSA has failed to achieve that objective."
Unless you already have a Pornhub account, trying to access it in the UK after February 2 means you'll be met by a 'wall'. This extends to other Aylo-owned sites that include the likes of YouPorn and Redtube.
🚨 NEW: Pornhub has announced it will restrict access to UK users from 2 February due to the Online Safety Act
— Politics UK (@PolitlcsUK) January 27, 2026
Only users who sign up and verify their ID before then will be able to access the site pic.twitter.com/SrcdRykKm3
Aylo is owned by Ethical Capital Partners (ECP), with spokesman Solomon Friedman adding that while he believes Ofcom was "working in good faith" to ensure age check requirements were followed, it hasn't worked.
Friedman maintained: "The problem here, however, is not the regulator - it is the law.
"You have a dedicated regulator working in good faith, but unfortunately, the law they are operating under cannot possibly succeed."
Pornhub has previously called out other sites that might not be as regulated, and six months on, Friedman says it's still easy to access pornography online without age verification. He now looks to manufacturers like Apple, Google, and Microsoft to restrict access for minors at a device level: "When access is controlled at the device level, it is efficient, it's effective, it's privacy-preserving."
While those who've previously undergone age verification and have an account with Pornhub and the other Aylo sites won't see any difference from what they do now, the porn Goliath warns that millions could soon be locked out.