Are you tired of constant video ads and banners disrupting your YouTube viewing experience? You‘re not alone. In this comprehensive guide, I‘ll show you three different methods to effectively block ads on YouTube so you can enjoy uninterrupted videos.
Overview: Stopping YouTube Ads for Good
YouTube relies on advertisements as essential income to pay for operations and video creator royalties. But as a viewer, ads are disruptive and ruin the enjoyment of using the platform.
Luckily, by subscribing to YouTube Premium, or by using an ad blocking browser/app, you can eliminate ads from the site for smoother streaming. Each solution has pros and cons we’ll examine.
My goal is to illustrate the differences between the options below so you can decide the best way to remove YouTube ads suiting your needs:
- YouTube Premium – Official paid subscription
- Ad blocking browsers – Software like Brave
- Video ad blocker apps – Mobile programs like AdBlock
Let’s dive in to how each works!
Why YouTube Needs Ads
YouTube is the world‘s largest video hosting platform. Over 500 hours of new content gets uploaded every minute!
To fund all the infrastructure for serving and streaming this vast catalog, YouTube relies on advertisements as primary income.
In 2020, YouTube earned $19.8 billion in ad revenue. Ads not only keep it running, they also provide royalties that video creators depend on through the Partner Program.
So while annoying, ads are the necessary tradeoff for enjoying everything YouTube offers. But paying subscribers or prudent ad blocker usage allow you to avoid them.
Benefits of Upgrading to Premium
The most robust way to eliminate YouTube ads is upgrading to their premium YouTube Premium subscription. For $11.99/month in the US, Premium provides:
- No Advertisements – Zero pre-roll, mid-roll or display ads
- Background Play – Videos keep playing with app minimized
- Offline Downloads – Save videos/music locally on your device
- Uninterrupted Playback – Videos aren‘t paused by promotions
Beyond removing ads, Premium brings convenience perks enhancing the viewing experience – translating to over 2 million paying subscribers globally so far.
And the impact is noticeable, as this chart shows:
| Feature | Regular YouTube | YouTube Premium |
|---|---|---|
| Ads | Yes | No Ads |
| App Playback | Stops | Uninterrupted |
| Offline Viewing | Not Allowed | Downloads enabled |
| Streaming Quality | Limited | High-resolution |
| Other Features | Basic | Enhanced overall |
Now let‘s walk through signing up for Premium step-by-step.
How to Subscribe to YouTube Premium
Ready to remove YouTube ads through the Premium upgrade? Follow these steps to subscribe:
Step 1) Visit youtube.com and sign into your Google account managing YouTube
Step 2) Go to the YouTube Premium page
Step 3) Click the "Try it Free" button to start a 1 month trial
Step 4) Enter your payment information (credit/debit card or PayPal)
Step 5) Review your membership terms and hit "Start 1 month free trial"!
Once enrolled, ads will stop across YouTube properties on your account. After the trial, Premium auto-renews at $11.99/month (cancel beforehand to avoid charge).
I know that still sounds steep. But remember – a single YouTube ad can be up to 6 seconds long. Over many videos, you‘ll waste hours of life annually stuck watching ads! Doing the math, Premium pays for itself through time savings alone.
And if you watch YouTube daily, removing ads through Premium creates an improved, ad-free streaming experience on par with Netflix or Prime Video.
Clever Use of Ad Blockers
What if you can‘t swing the Premium fees? Using an ad blocking browser or extension allows reducing ads without paying.
Popular ad blockers like uBlock Origin and Brave Browser prevent display ads and side banners on YouTube. By removing visual clutter, pages load faster and cleaner.
So ad blockers work great supplementing video ad removers we‘ll discuss next. However, most ad blockers unfortunately can‘t handle YouTube video ads specifically.
I‘ll demonstrate installing uBlock Origin here since it‘s top-rated software available cross-platform:
Step 1) Download uBlock Origin
Step 2) Open your Chrome/Firefox extensions dashboard
Step 3) Drag + drop uBlock Origin into active extensions
Step 4) Visit YouTube and see ads removed from page!
Now let‘s tackle stopping in-stream/mid-roll ads too…
Mobile Apps That Block YouTube Video Ads
Video ad blocking apps target the pre-roll/mid-roll ads within YouTube clips that display blockers miss. Top choices like AdBlock, Adblock Plus, and Video Ad-Blocker work great erasing video ads on Android and iPhone.
For example, Adblock Plus has over 10 million active installs across devices. It strips ads with crowd-sourced filter lists automatically updated. Reviews praise how well Adblock handles YouTube video ads specifically.
I suggest reading different option reviews before installing any ad blocking app. Only download reputable choices with recent updates from the official store. This guarantees safety and reliability.
While not 100% robust as Premium, combining a trustworthy video ad remover app + visual ad blocker browser will together create an ad-light YouTube experience on mobile and PCs completely free.
Say Goodbye to YouTube Ads!
I hope this guide gave you a comprehensive overview for stopping distracting YouTube ads through different solutions I personally recommend and use myself.
The best complete option is clearly the official YouTube Premium membership if you watch lots of YouTube across devices. But smart leveraging of ad blockers works great too – just mind safety using 3rd party apps.
Have any other questions on removing YouTube ads? Ask away in the comments! I‘m here to help you reclaim ad-free streaming.
Regards,
[Your name]
