Google revives YouTube Premium Lite, but this time with "limited ads"
When it comes to Google and YouTube, the most likely news that you have heard in the past year is that Google is intensifying its fight against content blockers, increasing ads on YouTube, and increasing the price of YouTube Premium.
The price of a premium YouTube subscription varies widely. Users from Switzerland, for instance, pay about $21 per month for a subscription. If you are from Germany, you pay about $13 per month and in Japan, it is about $8 per month for a single subscription. The price range is between $1 and $21 for a single subscription.
Google has been testing a cheaper version of YouTube Premium in some countries last year.
YouTube Premium Lite allowed users from a few select countries, including Denmark, the Netherlands, and Belgium, to subscribe to a cheaper plan. Google cut access to YouTube Music from the Premium Lite plan.
In other words: YouTube Premium Lite subscribers would get an ad-free experience on YouTube for a cheaper price.
Things went very quiet shortly after news broke about YouTube Premium Lite. It appears that Google has now revived the plan, but in different countries.
Goodbye old YouTube Premium Lite - Hello new YouTube Premium Lite
According to Android Authority, Google says that the new YouTube Premium Lite plan has nothing to do with the old. The new plan is available for select users from Australia, Germany, and Thailand at the time.
In Australia and Germany, it is available for about half the price of YouTube Premium. In Australia, select users may subscribe to Premium Lite for $11.99 Australian Dollar. Users from Germany may pay €5.99, roughly $6.50 per month, for the Premium Lite plan.
Here are the core differences between YouTube Premium and Premium Lite:
- Premium: ad-free, download and play offline, background play, and YouTube Music Premium included.
- Premium Lite: limited ads, no downloads, play offline, background play, or YouTube Music Premium.
Limited ads, according to YouTube, means that "ads may appear on licensed music content, or when you search or browse". It is therefore not a true ad-free experience.
Since it is a test, it is possible that Google is going to end Premium Lite for YouTube once again after the test ends.
It all depends on the data that Google gets during the test. If enough users subscribe, it may very well be worth an expansion into different countries.
Closing Words
YouTube Premium Lite is once again in testing. This time with limited ads, which some users may not mind, as ads in videos are not shown for most content. Others may dislike that they pay and still see some ads on the platform.
Also, knowing Google's track record, the revival does not really mean much at this point. Nothing is certain at this point; not the price, not the availability of the plan, not whether it will be around in a week's time or expanded to other countries.
If you ask me, I still think that the plan is priced too high for the likes of many potential subscribers. Pay half the price of a YouTube Premium subscription, but do get some ads while searching, browsing, or playing (select) licensed music content? It sounds like a bad deal and many users may prefer to stick to the trusted content blocker or other solutions when it comes to YouTube.
Would you subscribe to YouTube Premium Lite for half the price of YouTube Premium, if it would launch in your country? Feel free to leave a comment down below.
Pay for ads-ridden content? Lolno.
Pay !#$%ing Google for, well… Anything? You must be kidding me.
FreeTube is much better option.
https://github.com/FreeTubeApp/FreeTube
https://freetubeapp.io/
Features:
Watch videos without ads
Use YouTube without Google tracking you using cookies and JavaScript
Two extractor APIs to choose from (Built in or Invidious)
Subscribe to channels without an account
Connect to an externally setup proxy such as Tor
View and search your local subscriptions, history, and saved videos
Organize your subscriptions into “Profiles” to create a more focused feed
Export & import subscriptions
Youtube Trending
Youtube Chapters
Most popular videos page based on the set Invidious instance
SponsorBlock
Open videos from your browser directly into FreeTube (with extension)
Watch videos using an external player
Full Theme support
Make a screenshot of a video
Multiple windows
Mini Player (Picture-in-Picture)
Keyboard shortcuts
Option to show only family friendly content
Show/hide functionality or elements within the app using the distraction free settings
View channel community posts
View most age restricted videos
@samurai cat,
Minimum Windows 10 to run Freetube so that cuts me out since I’m still on Win 8.1
But I can still use Invidious to play YT videos so no big deal. https://docs.invidious.io/faq/#table-of-contents
Alternative to Invidious is Materialious: https://github.com/Materialious/Materialious
You can also use: https://piped.video/ as an alternative to YouTube website.
https://github.com/TeamPiped/Piped
Looks interesting, but it seems to experience the same issues which Invidious suffers from namely youtube throttling downloads.
Also, I couldn’t find a way to turn off dark mode on your link other than using the system colors option on FF set to “Always” rather than the default “Only with high contrast sites”. But it’s not very pretty to look at in that mode.
It looks to me though that clicking a link to a youtube video is supposed to redirect it to a Piped instance. But that’s not the way I do it on Invidious. Instead, I use the video context menu to obtain the link (Copy video URL) paste it into Notepad and then copy the video ID and then paste that onto an Invidious instance. Works most of the time without installing anything.
But thanks anyway for the tip.
Never !
Destroy google !
Destroy Meta !
Destroy MS !
Destroy Apple !
Destroy HP !
Destroy DT !
Destroy Sprctrum !
Destroy Verison !
Destroy corporate greed, lies, thievery, manipulation !
Man, that felt good.
Incredibly good joke (if it were a joke) or incredible amount of well wishes (if it were a wish). You made my night with some laughs here. Thanks to @Martin for the article too! :]
Question : “Would you subscribe to YouTube Premium Lite for half the price of YouTube Premium, if it would launch in your country?”
Answer : No. Not a penny. I could consider subscribing in other circumstances such as those relevant of a company which makes it living only with this one and only video service and is not at all stained with tracking its users as a policy. Google makes enormous profits, I see no reason to fill the wallet of one of its services because this service would be less profitable than others. And moreover tracks, tracks and tracks. No, no way, not a penny.
I meant, of course, trackers, trackers, trackers, those of tracking. An audio/video service without tracks would be sort of problematic :)
They’ve been pulling this bait and switch since cable TV first came out.
>paying for basic features
An annoyance-free user experience is not a premium feature, it’s common sense and respect of the userbase.
While I enjoy science podcasts on YouTube, I see no reason to pay anything. Ads are brief and many are skippable after five seconds.
From Prime experience, limited ads starts with two per hour. After they get you thinking, ‘I might be able to put up with that’, it starts accelerating. I’m now getting movies broken a couple of times with up to three ads each per break. Not as bad as FTA TV, but heading in that direction.
No. Not even for one penny. Privacy…
Youtube, you better change the name to Tiredtube, because it’s so tired, so really tired.
Thanks for the article! :]