Plenty of people watch YouTube videos on mobile devices or a computer and have to deal with sporadic advertising popping up at the beginning. But if you primarily watch YouTube on your TV through an installed app or gaming console, you’ll be getting longer ads – even when you pause a video.

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Forced Ads on YouTube

When using a social media platform or video-sharing service, you expect a certain amount of advertising. It’s part and parcel of how these platforms work, with advertising often being the biggest generator of revenue.

This is especially prominent on YouTube, where users can see as many as three or four ads in a single video. However, those are usually about 15 seconds in length, and you can skip them after watching about 5 to 10 seconds. Of course, there are also ad blockers for mobile and desktop browsers that completely remove the ads. 

While it didn’t specifically mention ad blockers as the reason, YouTube revealed that it would soon start introducing unskippable 30-second ads for users who watch videos on a TV. This will initially happen when watching “top-performing YouTube content” from creators who signed up for YouTube Select, a new advertising platform. The platform initially had 30-second ad slots but phased it out in 2018.

These details were announced at the YouTube Brandcast event. It was explained that users will also start seeing advertising when they pause a video. For now, these ads are dismissed by clicking on a button, but they could also be made unskippable in the future. It’s not as intrusive as it sounds, as the pause ads are essentially a graphical overlay, similar to what many streamers use to promote their other channels or contact details.

There is no definitive date yet for when the YouTube pause ads will roll out. YouTube has only mentioned that it could roll out toward the end of this year or early next year.

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