Google’s crackdown on ad blockers on YouTube started in early August. The company began tests that informed a small percentage of users with ad blockers that “ad blockers were not allowed on YouTube”.
In August, things heated up as Google started to display the prompts aggressively to users with ad blockers. Two months on and it is now confirmed that Google is cracking down on the use of content blockers on YouTube globally.
Ad blocking was always a cat and mouse game on the Internet. As ad blockers evolved and started to gain tractions, sites and publishers began to develop countermeasures. Some introduced paywalls, others modified ads on their sites or used different techniques to display ads even on systems with ad blockers.
Developers of ad blockers reacted to these changes, and the whole thing began anew.
Impact on YouTube users
Google’s crackdown seems to have a severe impact on users who use ad blockers. It appears that a portion of users who use ad blockers on YouTube have uninstalled them to continue watching videos at the site.
While uninstallations have increased, installations of ad blockers have increased as well. A report from Wired includes quotes from several companies that produce content blockers.
The makers of AdGuard, a popular blocking tool with 75 million users, including 4.5 million paying customers, saw uninstallations jump from about 6000 per day to 52,000 in October. Installations surged to about 60,000 installations as well, levelling the number of installations and uninstallations. The paid version of AdGuard was not affected by this, according to the company.
Munich-based Ghostery noticed up to five times the installs and uninstalls throughout October, according to the report. Most users, when asked for the reason for uninstalling the extension, stated that it was not working anymore on YouTube.
Why installs and uninstalls are surging
Ad blocker users who run into issues on YouTube have just a few options. They can follow Google’s advice and turn off the ad blocker. This allows them to watch YouTube videos with ads.
Another option is the purchase of YouTube Premium, but this comes at a monthly cost. Google announced an increase in the price as well recently.
The third option is to try different content blockers to find one that works. Users evaluate different content blockers until they find one that works or until they give up.
This explains the increase in uninstalls and installs at the same time. Even top of the line content blockers, like uBlock Origin, may fail to block ads on YouTube for a short period of time.
Well maintained content blockers and filter lists are updated frequently to react to changes that Google introduced on YouTube. It is still a cat and mouse game, and will continue to be one.
You can check out my guide on watching YouTube videos without ads here. It offers several options besides using content blockers. All of these methods work, but they may have disadvantages.
Now You: do you visit YouTube regularly?