YouTube Premium finally made it onto Parks Associate’s top 10 U.S. subscription streaming video services list, claiming the tenth spot, an indicator that its aggressive actions to banish ad-blockers is working.
The service has been bolstering its efforts to stop viewers from using ad-blockers on its platform as the extensions violate YouTube’s terms of service. The company on Tuesday touted a “global effort” to stamp them out.
“The use of ad blockers violate YouTube’s Terms of Service,” said a Google spokesperson. “We’ve launched a global effort to urge viewers with ad blockers enabled to allow ads on YouTube or try YouTube Premium for an ad free experience. Ads support a diverse ecosystem of creators globally and allow billions to access their favorite content on YouTube.”
The effort to force out ad-blockers, which cut into its ad-generated revenue, is taking hold. Google posted third-quarter ad-revenue from YouTube of $7.95 billion, compared with $7.07 billion a year earlier.
The ad-blocker crackdown also aims to drive viewers to the company’s paid tier, YouTube Premium. The site has been relentless in offering users the option to switch to the Premium tier.
YouTube Premium offers users an ad-free experience for $13.99 a month, as well as family and student plans. With a subscription, customers can also download videos for offline viewing and access YouTube Music Premium.
Users have voiced their dissatisfaction since the company began blocking content for viewers using the loophole extensions. But as with Netflix’s password-sharing crackdown, the results have actually been beneficial for the company.
In July, with an active ad-blocker, viewers could watch three videos on YouTube’s free tier. After that, the platform would block its content. By September, the video app ramped up its anti-ad-blocker efforts. Viewers with an active ad-blocker said some videos were blacked out completely.