The businesses that produce ad blockers are suffering as a result of YouTube’s crackdown. Thousands of individuals are reportedly uninstalling ad blocking software, according to many companies, after YouTube began alerting users who attempted to watch videos on its website while using an ad blocker.
AdGuard, one of the companies, informed Wired that since October 9, over 11,000 users had removed the Chrome extension, up from 6,000 daily removals before to YouTube’s modification. 52,000 users removed AdGuard on October 18, according to CTO Andrey Meshkov of the business, who spoke with Wired. Nevertheless, more people are installing the AdGuard premium version, which is unaffected by YouTube’s shutdown.
Ghostery, a different ad blocker, said that October usage was steady despite three to five times as many installs and uninstalls per day. Notably, the business said that more than 90% of users who responded to a poll asking them why they removed a product claimed it was because YouTube no longer supported it.
Some users even attempted to utilize other browsers as a workaround, as YouTube’s crackdown appears to primarily affect users who access its website through Chrome on laptops and desktop computers. According to Ghostery, the number of Microsoft Edge browser installations increased by 30% in October over September, as reported by Wired.
The amount that YouTube advertisements bring in for Google is rising. Through September of this year, the firm sold almost $22 billion worth of ads on the site. However, the streaming service is also making an effort to encourage more users to subscribe to YouTube Premium, which removes advertisements and enables access to YouTube Music, downloads videos, and higher-quality streaming of videos. The corporation increased the monthly cost of YouTube Premium by $2 to $14 earlier this year.
