I don't think it's possible on a phone, but in a browser you can remove videos from your watch history. Click the three dots next to the video for options, and select not interested. Google actually seems to take these into account, I had watched an Alex Jones video that was linked from elsewhere, and while it is good to not have too much of a bubble there's just certain things I don't need to see more of.
Or, just use a separate browser. I typically only use opera for YouTube & anything where I don't mind Google tracking me, but if I open a YouTube link in Firefox I'm not logged in (and w/ opera's VPN enabled it doesn't appear to affect YouTube recommendations). I'm sure Google does correlate traffic between the two to some extent, but this seems like the only useful way to use operas integrated VPN.
Or, just use a separate browser. I typically only use opera for YouTube & anything where I don't mind Google tracking me, but if I open a YouTube link in Firefox I'm not logged in (and w/ opera's VPN enabled it doesn't appear to affect YouTube recommendations). I'm sure Google does correlate traffic between the two to some extent, but this seems like the only useful way to use operas integrated VPN.