GoKawiilRyan Haines / Android Authority
YouTube is still, at its core, a free service. And while you don’t have to pay a dime to dive into its bottomless archives of content, sometimes it feels like Google is literally doing everything possible to convince us to shell out and pay for YouTube Premium. Most recently, that’s taken the form of some aggressive new ads — and viewers are understandably pretty upset.
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While ads themselves are hardly a new addition to the unpaid YouTube experience, the introduction of unskippable 30-second ads for YouTube on TVs has definitely rankled a few of us here on the Android Authority team. In the interest of getting a better sense of just how big a deal this is for YouTube’s broader audience, we put the question to you: What do you think of unskippable 30-second ads on YouTube’s TV app? And with those results now in, it looks like we’re in some very good company: Far and away, the majority of the 6,700-some of you who responded are adamantly in the we-don’t-like-long-unskippable-ads camp. Admittedly, there was basically zero chance of the “fine with this” option performing better than “hate those ads,” but it’s still very interesting to see exactly how the rest of this breakdown comes together.
We’ve got only a little over a sixth of you paying for YouTube Premium, and about half as many “hacking” YouTube by snaking your way around those ads without paying.
Looking through the comments coming in alongside the poll, reader the.ryan.long seems to hold a grudge against the companies running these ads, more than harboring negative feelings towards YouTube directly: “I don’t know how companies find unskippable ads profitable cause skippable is bad enough but if I got ads I couldn’t skip I’d ensure I NEVER bought their product. I’d go out my way to do so too.”
Others just see this as further justification for their choice to support creators through YouTube Premium. Reader aww07la writes: “$8 per month is a very small price to pay to not deal with it. I watch way too much YouTube to ever go without premium. So, yeah I don’t care and didn’t even notice.” Then there are users like scober who voice concern that this is just a slippery slope that will see ads expand to even Premium: “Just wait till they alter the playing field and premium means ‘less adds’ – premium plus will be the new premium and you’ll pay more.”
What these numbers don’t get into — and what we probably should have included as an option — is how many of you in the “hate” camp are simultaneously feeling like now might finally be a good time to subscribe. Even if you can’t stomach full-price Premium, Premium Lite is now more accessible than ever, and just sweetened the deal with some new features.
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