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I'd gladly pay for YouTube without ads if I trusted that it would remain ad free, but the track record from various companies on this is not good.

iLoveOncall 1y ago
So pay now and stop paying if they introduce ads? It's not like it's a lifetime subscription. I've been paying for it for a year+ for my girlfriend who was watching more ads than content and we've never seen ads since.
- labrador 1y ago
  That's good to know. I was hoping for a reply like yours. I will subscribe. YouTube is an amazing resource for human kind and I agree those of us who can afford it should pay to support it.
  - rightbyte 1y ago
    Seems strange to me to support Google with your money from a moral perspective. It is a spyware company.
- j45 1y ago
  Totally, there's not a lot of places to vote with your dollars to get rid of interruptions like Ads, and also get back a lot of time of your life.
naikrovek 1y ago
I pay for YouTube premium for my family and there haven’t been any injected ads at all. Only the ones that the video themselves have in, which are also very annoying. I can’t speak for the future, but I’ve had this for probably 5 years and I haven’t seen a single ad, only the videos that I’ve asked to see.
- j45 1y ago
  Same experience. The family plan is nice to share with family to reduce how much everyone's exposed to ads. In-Video sponsorships are a pain, sometimes they are chaptered out enough and can be skipped. If I could pay for an ad-free google search I probably would. Off the shelf, not doing API calls.
  - kenmacd 1y ago
    <cough> SponsorBlock (https://sponsor.ajay.app/ https://sponsor.ajay.app/) <cough> It works amazingly well provided a video's been out for at least a half hour or so. It also has the option to skip the "like and subscribe" parts too. I also tried the https://dearrow.ajay.app/ https://dearrow.ajay.app/ extension to replace clickbait titles, but decided I'd rather know when a channel/video is too clickbait-y so I can block/unsubscribe.
    - ThunderSizzle 1y ago
      I wish many of these suggestion worked for casting. Browser extensions don't fix a chromecast skipping ads, for example. It'd have to be written into the casting client, I'd presume.
      - j45 1y ago
        Yeah, this can be a consideration, and also a non-issue with Youtube Premium
- dexterdog 1y ago
  That's what sponsorblock is for
Karsteski 1y ago
I tried paying for YouTube premium then they fucked around by not giving me all the features I paid for when I was visiting another country. There's no winning with these people.
- dandellion 1y ago
  I paid premium a few months, then they added shorts and there was no way to block them, so I installed a blocker and stopped paying for it.
- jklas2hjdsdk 1y ago
  Yes me too, and they fucked me.
ProllyInfamous 1y ago
If you simply add a `-` (en-dash) between the `t` & 2nd `u` in the URL, your viewing experience automatically skips all external ads, without login/premium. Syntax: www.yout-ube.com/watch?v=XqZsoesa55w This also works for playlists, and auto-repeats. edit: is this getting downvoted because it works and people are worried this service might disappear should this bypass become too popular..? Just curious.
j45 1y ago
Youtube premium has remained adfree as far as I know. Best to try it out yourself. I can't watch Youtube with Ads ever anymore. If a 100% Ad-free youtube premium at the current price point ever went away, something would have to change about the ads.
- lpcvoid 1y ago
  Nah, Firefox with ublock origin is better than giving money to google.
  - iLoveOncall 1y ago
    You also give money to the creators you watch by watching ads or watching with YouTube premium. You also can't block ads on iPhones, which a majority of the developed world uses. My girlfriend has never watched a YouTube video on something other than an Apple device for example.
    - heraldgeezer 1y ago
      >You also can't block ads on iPhones, which a majority of the developed world uses. My girlfriend has never watched a YouTube video on something other than an Apple device for example. People really live like this... ? Like those who watch movies on their phones lmao. Also, Brave works on iphone -> m.youtube.com adfree :) Then again I went years not using conditioner and moisturiser for my skin, only deo... We all need tips from people who know better you know. (Im white.)
    - lucb1e 1y ago
      I'd rather send money to the people I want to support than fund a middleman > which a majority of the developed world uses ... the USA? It's not a majority in any other country that I'm aware of I've got a Eurocentric view though, I have e.g. no idea if Singapore or China has a majority of Apple users or where you draw the line on 'developed' (critique on the term: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Factfulness&oldid=1292227344#Four_income_levels https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Factfulness&oldid...)
matheusmoreira 1y ago
Paying to avoid ads just makes your attention even more valuable to them. Always block them unconditionally and without any payment. Ads are a violation of the sanctity of our minds. They are not entitled to our attention. It's not currency to pay for services with.
- luoc 1y ago
  Can you elaborate a bit? Why would that make my attention more valuable than other's?
  - tyre 1y ago
    If you are a paying subscriber, you are self-identifying as (likely) a higher net-worth. The problem for ad platforms allowing paid opt-out is that the most valuable users leave the network. Then they have to go to advertisers and say, “advertise on our network where all the wealthier people are not.” A brand like Tiffany’s or Rolex (both huge advertisers) aren’t going to opt into that.
    - layer8 1y ago
      A YouTube subscription doesn’t exactly break the bank. Being able to afford it doesn’t make you wealthy. Apart from that, you can bet that YouTube is pricing it in a way that they aren’t losing out compared to ad revenue.
      - h2zizzle 1y ago
        It's a decent chunk of change for the sole purpose of avoiding ads on a single platform that barely pays the people actually producing the content. If you're looking to access premium content and YouTube Music, it's a slightly better value proposition (but only slightly, because YTM sucks, especially compared to what GPM used to be). For that ~$120 a year, you could buy a bunch of Steam games to occupy the same amount of time as your YT habit. Or you could buy a sub to services like Nebula which actually pay content creators decently. Or you could buy an external hard drive, install yt-dlp, and embrace Talk Like A Pirate Day, Groundhog Day-style.
jamesfmilne 1y ago
I've been paying for YouTube premium for probably 2 years now. Never had any inserted ads. Only the "this video is sponsored by" stuff, which you can just skip over. I can't possibly go back to non-Premium YouTube, and if they mess around with Premium I'll probably be moving on from YouTube.
stefan_ 1y ago
They rolled out the Chrome "kill adblockers" update globally then unleashed the new wave of YouTube "anti-adblock" a month later. While in a literal losing court case thats suggesting Chrome be split out from Google as a whole. They must be so confident nothing can touch them.
raincole 1y ago
Youtube premium has been ad-free for 10 years. What kind of track record do you need? 20 years? 100 years?
- vinyl7 1y ago
  Netflix and other streaming sites have ads on some paid subscriptions. First they start with ad free subs, then introduce ads and introduce a higher priced tier to get rid of ads
  - raincole 1y ago
    So if one supermarket sold expired food, we should avoid another supermarket that has not been doing that for 10 years? Google/Youtube doesn't own Netflix. If anything, the reasonable response would be to unsub Netflix and sub its competitors, like, uh, Youtube.
    - eviks 1y ago
      No, if all the big supermarkets sell expired food from time to time to meet profitability expectations, there is no reason to believe one will be so unique as to be able to resist using the same industry standard, especially when it already has a much bigger expired food business
  - WrongAssumption 1y ago
    Can't you just stop subscribing when that happens? You aren't signing a 5 year contract.
- eviks 1y ago
  It has never been ad-free, sponsored segments have always existed
  - arccy 1y ago
    you should blame the creators for being greedy, not YouTube for that
jorvi 1y ago
Don't let everyone responding gaslight you. YouTube Premium is absolutely stuffed with ads[0] (sorry, 'promoted content' / 'sponsorship'). The only probable explanation I have for this is that Google has successfully boiled the frog and people mentally don't even register these things as ads anymore. And that's not to mention pretty much every single creator stuffing sponsored sections into their videos now. We have Sponsorblock for now, but I imagine Google will try to introduce random offsets at some point which will render Sponsorblock mute. Maybe an AI blocker will rise up in the future? At any rate, fight fire with fire. Just use every bit of adblocking on desktop, Revanced on Android and hope that Revanced or Youtube++ comes to iOS 3rd party stores at some point. [0]https://imgur.com/a/3emEhsF https://imgur.com/a/3emEhsF Edit: since people are too lazy to click on the link and instead ram the downvote button in blind rage, image 1 and 4 contain straight up ads, unconnected to creators.
- jowea 1y ago
  I think people just decided it doesn't count as ads when it's the creator doing it. And it feels more tolerable since the money is going to the creator that they probably like instead of megacorp Google.
  - jorvi 1y ago
    1 and 4 contain straight up ads.
- imiric 1y ago
  I'm honestly baffled why anyone who objects to ads would still want to use any of the official YouTube clients. Whether or not they show ads to you on YouTube, they still track your every move and use it to improve their profile of you so that they can show you ads on any of their other platforms, sell your data, or whatever other shady business they do behind the scenes to extract value from it. Adtech cannot be trusted. I refuse to support their empire whether that's financially or with my data and attention.
- userbinator 1y ago
  And that's not to mention pretty much every single creator stuffing sponsored sections into their videos now. Fortunately I mainly watch the videos which are not made by "creators" looking for $$$ but just people sharing something interesting and useful; the ones which have no annoying intros or outros, "like share and subscribe" drivel, and are often not much more than raw unedited content. They still exist on YouTube.
npteljes 1y ago
I just pay them until it works, and I'll reconsider once it changes. Don't worry about track record, you can stop paying anytime.

iLoveOncall 1y ago

So pay now and stop paying if they introduce ads? It's not like it's a lifetime subscription. I've been paying for it for a year+ for my girlfriend who was watching more ads than content and we've never seen ads since.

labrador 1y ago
That's good to know. I was hoping for a reply like yours. I will subscribe. YouTube is an amazing resource for human kind and I agree those of us who can afford it should pay to support it.
- rightbyte 1y ago
  Seems strange to me to support Google with your money from a moral perspective. It is a spyware company.
j45 1y ago
Totally, there's not a lot of places to vote with your dollars to get rid of interruptions like Ads, and also get back a lot of time of your life.

naikrovek 1y ago

I pay for YouTube premium for my family and there haven’t been any injected ads at all. Only the ones that the video themselves have in, which are also very annoying. I can’t speak for the future, but I’ve had this for probably 5 years and I haven’t seen a single ad, only the videos that I’ve asked to see.

j45 1y ago
Same experience. The family plan is nice to share with family to reduce how much everyone's exposed to ads. In-Video sponsorships are a pain, sometimes they are chaptered out enough and can be skipped. If I could pay for an ad-free google search I probably would. Off the shelf, not doing API calls.
- kenmacd 1y ago
  <cough> SponsorBlock (https://sponsor.ajay.app/ https://sponsor.ajay.app/) <cough> It works amazingly well provided a video's been out for at least a half hour or so. It also has the option to skip the "like and subscribe" parts too. I also tried the https://dearrow.ajay.app/ https://dearrow.ajay.app/ extension to replace clickbait titles, but decided I'd rather know when a channel/video is too clickbait-y so I can block/unsubscribe.
  - ThunderSizzle 1y ago
    I wish many of these suggestion worked for casting. Browser extensions don't fix a chromecast skipping ads, for example. It'd have to be written into the casting client, I'd presume.
    - j45 1y ago
      Yeah, this can be a consideration, and also a non-issue with Youtube Premium
dexterdog 1y ago
That's what sponsorblock is for

Karsteski 1y ago

I tried paying for YouTube premium then they fucked around by not giving me all the features I paid for when I was visiting another country. There's no winning with these people.

dandellion 1y ago
I paid premium a few months, then they added shorts and there was no way to block them, so I installed a blocker and stopped paying for it.
jklas2hjdsdk 1y ago
Yes me too, and they fucked me.

ProllyInfamous 1y ago

If you simply add a `-` (en-dash) between the `t` & 2nd `u` in the URL, your viewing experience automatically skips all external ads, without login/premium. Syntax: www.yout-ube.com/watch?v=XqZsoesa55w This also works for playlists, and auto-repeats. edit: is this getting downvoted because it works and people are worried this service might disappear should this bypass become too popular..? Just curious.

j45 1y ago

Youtube premium has remained adfree as far as I know. Best to try it out yourself. I can't watch Youtube with Ads ever anymore. If a 100% Ad-free youtube premium at the current price point ever went away, something would have to change about the ads.

lpcvoid 1y ago
Nah, Firefox with ublock origin is better than giving money to google.
- iLoveOncall 1y ago
  You also give money to the creators you watch by watching ads or watching with YouTube premium. You also can't block ads on iPhones, which a majority of the developed world uses. My girlfriend has never watched a YouTube video on something other than an Apple device for example.
  - heraldgeezer 1y ago
    >You also can't block ads on iPhones, which a majority of the developed world uses. My girlfriend has never watched a YouTube video on something other than an Apple device for example. People really live like this... ? Like those who watch movies on their phones lmao. Also, Brave works on iphone -> m.youtube.com adfree :) Then again I went years not using conditioner and moisturiser for my skin, only deo... We all need tips from people who know better you know. (Im white.)
  - lucb1e 1y ago
    I'd rather send money to the people I want to support than fund a middleman > which a majority of the developed world uses ... the USA? It's not a majority in any other country that I'm aware of I've got a Eurocentric view though, I have e.g. no idea if Singapore or China has a majority of Apple users or where you draw the line on 'developed' (critique on the term: https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Factfulness&oldid=1292227344#Four_income_levels https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Factfulness&oldid...)

matheusmoreira 1y ago

Paying to avoid ads just makes your attention even more valuable to them. Always block them unconditionally and without any payment. Ads are a violation of the sanctity of our minds. They are not entitled to our attention. It's not currency to pay for services with.

luoc 1y ago
Can you elaborate a bit? Why would that make my attention more valuable than other's?
- tyre 1y ago
  If you are a paying subscriber, you are self-identifying as (likely) a higher net-worth. The problem for ad platforms allowing paid opt-out is that the most valuable users leave the network. Then they have to go to advertisers and say, “advertise on our network where all the wealthier people are not.” A brand like Tiffany’s or Rolex (both huge advertisers) aren’t going to opt into that.
  - layer8 1y ago
    A YouTube subscription doesn’t exactly break the bank. Being able to afford it doesn’t make you wealthy. Apart from that, you can bet that YouTube is pricing it in a way that they aren’t losing out compared to ad revenue.
    - h2zizzle 1y ago
      It's a decent chunk of change for the sole purpose of avoiding ads on a single platform that barely pays the people actually producing the content. If you're looking to access premium content and YouTube Music, it's a slightly better value proposition (but only slightly, because YTM sucks, especially compared to what GPM used to be). For that ~$120 a year, you could buy a bunch of Steam games to occupy the same amount of time as your YT habit. Or you could buy a sub to services like Nebula which actually pay content creators decently. Or you could buy an external hard drive, install yt-dlp, and embrace Talk Like A Pirate Day, Groundhog Day-style.

jamesfmilne 1y ago

I've been paying for YouTube premium for probably 2 years now. Never had any inserted ads. Only the "this video is sponsored by" stuff, which you can just skip over. I can't possibly go back to non-Premium YouTube, and if they mess around with Premium I'll probably be moving on from YouTube.

stefan_ 1y ago

They rolled out the Chrome "kill adblockers" update globally then unleashed the new wave of YouTube "anti-adblock" a month later. While in a literal losing court case thats suggesting Chrome be split out from Google as a whole. They must be so confident nothing can touch them.

raincole 1y ago

Youtube premium has been ad-free for 10 years. What kind of track record do you need? 20 years? 100 years?

vinyl7 1y ago
Netflix and other streaming sites have ads on some paid subscriptions. First they start with ad free subs, then introduce ads and introduce a higher priced tier to get rid of ads
- raincole 1y ago
  So if one supermarket sold expired food, we should avoid another supermarket that has not been doing that for 10 years? Google/Youtube doesn't own Netflix. If anything, the reasonable response would be to unsub Netflix and sub its competitors, like, uh, Youtube.
  - eviks 1y ago
    No, if all the big supermarkets sell expired food from time to time to meet profitability expectations, there is no reason to believe one will be so unique as to be able to resist using the same industry standard, especially when it already has a much bigger expired food business
- WrongAssumption 1y ago
  Can't you just stop subscribing when that happens? You aren't signing a 5 year contract.
eviks 1y ago
It has never been ad-free, sponsored segments have always existed
- arccy 1y ago
  you should blame the creators for being greedy, not YouTube for that

jorvi 1y ago

Don't let everyone responding gaslight you. YouTube Premium is absolutely stuffed with ads[0] (sorry, 'promoted content' / 'sponsorship'). The only probable explanation I have for this is that Google has successfully boiled the frog and people mentally don't even register these things as ads anymore. And that's not to mention pretty much every single creator stuffing sponsored sections into their videos now. We have Sponsorblock for now, but I imagine Google will try to introduce random offsets at some point which will render Sponsorblock mute. Maybe an AI blocker will rise up in the future? At any rate, fight fire with fire. Just use every bit of adblocking on desktop, Revanced on Android and hope that Revanced or Youtube++ comes to iOS 3rd party stores at some point. [0]https://imgur.com/a/3emEhsF https://imgur.com/a/3emEhsF Edit: since people are too lazy to click on the link and instead ram the downvote button in blind rage, image 1 and 4 contain straight up ads, unconnected to creators.

jowea 1y ago
I think people just decided it doesn't count as ads when it's the creator doing it. And it feels more tolerable since the money is going to the creator that they probably like instead of megacorp Google.
- jorvi 1y ago
  1 and 4 contain straight up ads.
imiric 1y ago
I'm honestly baffled why anyone who objects to ads would still want to use any of the official YouTube clients. Whether or not they show ads to you on YouTube, they still track your every move and use it to improve their profile of you so that they can show you ads on any of their other platforms, sell your data, or whatever other shady business they do behind the scenes to extract value from it. Adtech cannot be trusted. I refuse to support their empire whether that's financially or with my data and attention.
userbinator 1y ago
And that's not to mention pretty much every single creator stuffing sponsored sections into their videos now. Fortunately I mainly watch the videos which are not made by "creators" looking for $$$ but just people sharing something interesting and useful; the ones which have no annoying intros or outros, "like share and subscribe" drivel, and are often not much more than raw unedited content. They still exist on YouTube.

npteljes 1y ago

I just pay them until it works, and I'll reconsider once it changes. Don't worry about track record, you can stop paying anytime.