Summary
- YouTube Premium Lite at $8/mo cuts most ads, offering value without the full price hassle.
- Expect an occasional ad with Lite, but overall, fewer interruptions make for seamless viewing.
- YouTube’s cheaper tier outshines competitors by cutting ads while maintaining affordability.
I’m not a fan of ads, and I don’t imagine you are either, but they have become such a big part of our daily lives that it’s difficult to avoid them. Ad blockers work in a pinch, but they can only take you so far, at least when it comes to YouTube. Recent data shows more people are watching YouTube on their TV than computers these days, and that means an ad blocker can’t easily be utilized.
This is where YouTube Premium comes into play. Premium is a monthly subscription that removes all ads from YouTube. You don’t have to worry about playing before, during, or after a video, regardless of whether it’s an hour-long deep dive into a TV show or a music video. I used Premium for quite a while, but eventually, the price became too much for me to bear. I won’t lie, I missed it greatly. This is why Google introducing Premium Lite for a lower price speaks to me. After having trouble getting signed up on my primary account, I just swapped over to another profile that had the option to sign up. Premium Lite costs $8 a month, but I was able to get it for a month free since I’m on a “new” account that hasn’t tried the service after all. Even when it goes back up to full price, I don’t see myself getting rid of the service any time soon thanks to how much value I’m getting out of it.
YouTube Premium Lite
- What’s included?
- YouTube mostly ad-free
- Price
- $8 a month
- Live TV
- No
Premium Lite eliminates most ads
It doesn’t get rid of them all
Regular Premium removes ads from all content across YouTube, so Lite has to cut some corners to keep the price down. One such way was keeping ads on some videos, but I can confirm it’s not as bad as it sounds. As a matter of fact, I haven’t noticed a single change in ads based on how I use YouTube. If you’re like me and typically stay with regular videos instead of Shorts or music videos, you won’t have any ads. As a test, I scrolled through about 15 Shorts on my desktop and didn’t run into any ads there, so it looks like there’s not a lot to worry about there either. From the wording on Google’s blog post, it sounds like music is really the only area you’ll be noticing a difference.
I had my fair share of concerns about ads, but it ended up being a non-issue for me, surprisingly. If you like watching music videos on YouTube, you aren’t getting an experience like you would with the full-fledged Premium, but it’s close. There’s a lot of extra value baked into a Premium subscription when you factor in things like YouTube Music being included and being able to download videos with the price. For many people, having something that rivals Spotify included with the service is a big deal as it lets you save money by cutting out a separate music subscription. With so many subscription services nowadays, it’s nice to cut back when you can. Unfortunately, I don’t listen to music a lot, so having YouTube Music included didn’t move the needle like it would for others. I felt like that was a big reason why the price was the way it was with Premium, so seeing Lite remove it and lower the price is perfect for me.
I’ve been using Premium Lite for just a few days now, but I don’t have a lot to complain about. Aside from losing the option to download videos or use YouTube Music, it feels like the same service to me, just at a cheaper price. I know there are a lot of people in the same boat as me, so if you’re worried about ads interrupting your viewing habits, I can confirm there’s nothing to worry about. You’ll still see an occasional ad here and there, but there’s nothing on the level of using the free tier of YouTube. I can’t imagine ever going back to regular YouTube at this point, and I know I’m not alone.
Related
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YouTube is going in the right direction
I wish other streamers followed suit
YouTube / Pocket-lint
YouTube now offers two ways to skip ads on two different tiers, and that’s the same idea many streamers have. What’s interesting about YouTube is the cheaper tier still cuts out most ads, while other streamers are making their cheaper tiers ad-supported. This means if you want to save money on Netflix, you have to be okay with watching ads, but that’s not the case with YouTube Premium Lite.
Premium Lite is so good right now that I’m actually scared it’s not going to remain that way. There are many situations where a good service comes along, but untimely price hikes make it lose a lot of value. It’s happened with Google’s YouTube TV, a service that started as a much cheaper alternative to cable, but it’s now become one that rivals cable’s cost. Premium Lite costing less than $10 a month is nice because I’ve actually found myself using YouTube more than any other service as of late, which I suppose is backed up by Nielsen data. If this price can stay in this position, it’s a subscription I don’t see myself getting rid of any time soon. YouTube can keep adding more features to the regular Premium and increase the price there, but I hope Premium Lite stays the way it is. I don’t need any of the extra bells and whistles, I just want fewer ads.
Since these are the early days of the subscription, I expect the value to stay for a while to get more people signed up. Ultimately, I imagine Google wants to push people more toward spending more money, but I’m going to sit on the Premium Lite subscription for as long as I can and keep my fingers crossed there’s not a price hike. I wish other streamers offered a plan like this because I’d love to save money seeing limited to no ads. There must be some sort of middle ground between ads and no ads, and it looks like Premium Lite has solved that problem.
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