YouTube has warned people using ad blockers on the global video platform to stop using ad blockers or to switch to YouTube Premium. Given that YouTube earns its revenue from ads, the platform said using ad blockers will deprive it of revenues and that advertisers will turn to competitors.
The company stated that “ads allow YouTube to stay free for billions of users worldwide.”
For people who still insist on not seeing any ads on the videos they watch, the Google-owned company said they can subscribe to YouTube Premium which costs $12 per month or $120 per year. The company said the subscription will ensure that “creators can still get paid” for the video content they upload to the platform.
Earlier last month, YouTube showed a pop-up notification urging users to disable their ad blockers. But the organization has updated its notification to warn that users disable their ad blockers, switch to premium subscriptions, or have their viewing experience blocked after watching three videos. Viewers will have their playback disabled if they ignore repeated requests to allow ads.
YouTube said it is testing the idea of blocking users who refuse to disable their ad blockers globally. The company said it is “running a small experiment globally that urges viewers with ad blockers enabled to allow ads on YouTube or try YouTube Premium.”
For people who get notified of disabling their ad blockers when they are not activated in the first place, the company asked them to click on the “Report issue” link at the bottom of the notification to resolve the issue.
YouTube did not reveal the number of users that will be affected by its testing or the regions of the world where the tests will be conducted. But it is obvious that the company means business now, and given its revenue decline in the last three quarters, the video platform is aggressively out to tackle stubborn users implementing ad blockers.
In May, YouTube said its videos will go on to be unskippable, meaning that users will not be able to skip them until it runs their full course. The company also said it is increasing the length of its in-stream ads from 15 seconds to 30 seconds. The 30-second ads may be implemented on videos that are most popular on the platform.