YouTube Makes ‘Pause Ads’ Available to All Advertisers

YouTube users who don’t pay for YouTube Premium should soon start to see ads when they hit the Pause button. After the YouTube team started testing new “Pause experiences” with advertisers last year, a YouTube spokesperson has now confirmed to The Verge that all advertisers can now use this new ad format.

“As we’ve seen both strong advertiser and strong viewer response, we’ve since widely rolled out Pause ads to all advertisers,” YouTube Communications Manager Oluwa Falodun said in a statement to The Verge. Over the last couple of days, multiple Reddit users have been sharing their surprise after seeing ads for the first time after pausing a video.

Last year, Google said that this new ad format would allow advertisers to “drive awareness or action by owning that unique interactive moment when people pause a video. This is seamless for viewers and allows them to learn more about your brand,” the company said at the time.

YouTube isn’t the first video platform to introduce Pause ads. Hulu also launched similar ads five years ago, and Amazon Prime Video and Sling TV also launched them earlier this year. Amazon is probably a bit more pushy with its interactive Pause ad format that lets users add products to their cart or get more information by email. However, just like YouTube, Prime Video now lets users pay to get rid of ads.