In many households Surah Yasin is read on Thursday evening or Friday as a matter of course. Ask why and the usual answer is that there is a particular reward for reciting it on that day. The practice is old and widespread. Its evidence, though, is weaker than most people assume, and a large part of the confusion comes from a different surah entirely.
Where the Friday practice comes from
Several narrations circulate to the effect that whoever recites Surah Yasin on Friday, or on the night before it, will be forgiven. These reports are found in later collections rather than in the most rigorously screened ones, and hadith specialists have generally graded them weak. Some were judged very weak indeed.
That does not make the practice forbidden. It means the specific promise attached to it does not rest on firm ground, and it should not be taught to others as though it does.
The Surah Al-Kahf mix-up
Here is the part that explains most of the confusion. There is a Friday recitation practice with considerably stronger support, and it concerns Surah Al-Kahf, not Surah Yasin.
Narrations about reciting Al-Kahf on Friday are recorded through multiple routes and a good number of scholars accepted them as sound or acceptable. The practice of reading Al-Kahf every Friday is, on the evidence, on much firmer footing than reading Yasin on Friday.
Over time, in some communities, the weekly reading habit attached itself to Yasin instead, probably because Yasin is shorter, better known and more widely memorised. If you keep only one Friday habit, the sourced choice is Al-Kahf.
What scholars have said about it
Scholars have taken a range of positions. Some permit reciting Yasin on Friday on the general principle that reciting any part of the Qur’an is rewarded, while declining to affirm the specific virtue claimed for it. Others discourage singling out a particular day for a particular surah without established evidence, on the reasoning that fixing acts of worship to specific times is precisely the kind of thing that needs a clear basis.
Both positions are held by serious people. What almost nobody defends is stating the Friday reward as an established fact.
So should you stop reading it on Friday?
No, and that is worth saying plainly, because the honest answer here is often mistaken for a prohibition.
Reciting the Qur’an is rewarded on any day, and that reward is established on far stronger ground than any day-specific narration. If Friday is simply when you have time, when the household is together, or when the habit has stuck, there is no reason to abandon it.
The correction is narrow. Read it on Friday if that suits you. Do not teach others that Friday recitation carries a specific promised reward, because that part is not established.
A practical approach
If you want a Friday routine with the best evidentiary support, read Surah Al-Kahf. If you want to keep Yasin in the week, read it whenever it fits, with the meaning in front of you rather than as a race to finish.
Our guide to the benefits of Surah Yasin separates the established from the weak across all the common claims, and the plain English summary is the better use of the time you would spend on a disputed virtue.