diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 3e76a4efbb..fbf50072db 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -1771,7 +1771,7 @@ # EXTRACTOR ARGUMENTS
 #### youtube
 * `lang`: Prefer translated metadata (`title`, `description` etc) of this language code (case-sensitive). By default, the video primary language metadata is preferred, with a fallback to `en` translated. See [youtube.py](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/blob/c26f9b991a0681fd3ea548d535919cec1fbbd430/yt_dlp/extractor/youtube.py#L381-L390) for list of supported content language codes
 * `skip`: One or more of `hls`, `dash` or `translated_subs` to skip extraction of the m3u8 manifests, dash manifests and [auto-translated subtitles](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/issues/4090#issuecomment-1158102032) respectively
-* `player_client`: Clients to extract video data from. The main clients are `web`, `ios` and `android`, with variants `_music` and `_creator` (e.g. `ios_creator`); and `mediaconnect`, `mweb`, `android_producer`, `android_testsuite`, `android_vr`, `web_safari`, `web_embedded`, `tv` and `tv_embedded` with no variants. By default, `ios,web_creator` is used, and `tv_embedded`, `web_creator` and `mediaconnect` are added as required for age-gated videos. Similarly, the music variants are added for `music.youtube.com` urls. Most `android` clients will be given lowest priority since their formats are broken. You can use `all` to use all the clients, and `default` for the default clients. You can prefix a client with `-` to exclude it, e.g. `youtube:player_client=all,-web`
+* `player_client`: Clients to extract video data from. The main clients are `web`, `ios` and `android`, with variants `_music` and `_creator` (e.g. `ios_creator`); and `mediaconnect`, `mweb`, `android_producer`, `android_testsuite`, `android_vr`, `web_safari`, `web_embedded`, `tv` and `tv_embedded` with no variants. By default, `ios,mweb` is used, and `tv_embedded`, `web_creator` and `mediaconnect` are added as required for age-gated videos. Similarly, the music variants are added for `music.youtube.com` urls. Most `android` clients will be given lowest priority since their formats are broken. You can use `all` to use all the clients, and `default` for the default clients. You can prefix a client with `-` to exclude it, e.g. `youtube:player_client=all,-web`
 * `player_skip`: Skip some network requests that are generally needed for robust extraction. One or more of `configs` (skip client configs), `webpage` (skip initial webpage), `js` (skip js player). While these options can help reduce the number of requests needed or avoid some rate-limiting, they could cause some issues. See [#860](https://github.com/yt-dlp/yt-dlp/pull/860) for more details
 * `player_params`: YouTube player parameters to use for player requests. Will overwrite any default ones set by yt-dlp.
 * `comment_sort`: `top` or `new` (default) - choose comment sorting mode (on YouTube's side)
diff --git a/yt_dlp/extractor/youtube.py b/yt_dlp/extractor/youtube.py
index 1382c01b60..6acc42fc0a 100644
--- a/yt_dlp/extractor/youtube.py
+++ b/yt_dlp/extractor/youtube.py
@@ -1357,7 +1357,7 @@ class YoutubeIE(YoutubeBaseInfoExtractor):
         '401': {'ext': 'mp4', 'height': 2160, 'format_note': 'DASH video', 'vcodec': 'av01.0.12M.08'},
     }
     _SUBTITLE_FORMATS = ('json3', 'srv1', 'srv2', 'srv3', 'ttml', 'vtt')
-    _DEFAULT_CLIENTS = ('ios', 'web_creator')
+    _DEFAULT_CLIENTS = ('ios', 'mweb')
 
     _GEO_BYPASS = False