YouTube Premium users across the globe are facing significant price hikes as Google increases subscription costs in over a dozen countries. This follows earlier price jumps in various regions, including the United States last summer. The latest increases vary by region, with some countries experiencing hikes between 30% to 50%. For instance, in Ireland, Belgium, the Netherlands, and Italy, the Family plan will rise from €18 to €26 starting November, while the individual plan will increase by €2 to €14.
Countries affected by these changes include Ireland, Netherlands, Italy, Belgium, UAE, Switzerland, Malaysia, Saudi Arabia, Indonesia, Colombia, Thailand, Singapore, Norway, Sweden, Czech Republic, and Denmark. Although most Reddit reports are from European users, the price hikes also impact the Middle East, Colombia, Singapore, Thailand, and Indonesia. YouTube had already raised its subscription prices in India by 15–20% in late August.
I’ve been paying $25 CAD to support five family accounts and prevent my daughter from seeing ads during her monitored viewing. If that price goes up 30-50%, I’m fucking done. This was an expense I was willing to incur, as YouTube is literally the only media platform my family even uses anymore. Better price than cable and multiple streaming platforms, and (again) I’m paying that for five active accounts.
If anyone knows of a way for me to adblock through my Roku TV so that we can continue watching YouTube on it without a Premium account, I’m all ears. The TV is the only reason I’m not just using uBlock to begin with. I’m really not into the idea of hooking a laptop up via HDMI if I can avoid it. Just feels like a sloppy user experience for anyone else in the household wanting to watch YouTube on TV.
You got a scrap Roku and move into a platform that supports one of the ad-free clients but I wouldn’t do that just yet. YouTube’s about to shove in-stream ads down which is going to break every bit of that blocking for quite a bit It might turn out something else is the way to go by the time the dust settles.
Pi-hole, although really you can accomplish network ad blocking with just about any spare computer.
JK refer to the comment below mine
Pihole doesn’t block YouTube ads as it’s only a dns blocker, Google serves the ads from the same servers as the videos from what I understand. Adguard home works the same.
Correct. I use the AdGuard DNS servers on my router and get less ads on things occasionally but it YouTube. It’s been most noticable on Duolingo because now it always plays the Duolingo premium version ad. I’m guessing that it plays that when it fails to fetch a normal ad.
