Is YouTube About to Blow Up Ad Blockers For Good?

Is YouTube About to Blow Up Ad Blockers For Good?

The platform’s clever move will make ads technically indistinguishable from video content. What does that mean for advertisers?

YouTube Delivering Ads In-Stream to Kill Blockers

Your YouTube ads might start getting more reach soon, as the platform takes its battle against ad-blockers to the next level.

It’s testing server-side ad injection, a technique that embeds ads directly into video streams.

This makes ads indistinguishable from content for software and extensions that try to filter out advertising.

The move, of course, part of YouTube's broader crackdown on ad-blocking, which has seen the platform target browser ad-blockers and third-party YouTube apps popular on mobile.

This is a big technical hurdle as it requires changes to YouTube's core video delivery infrastructure. But clearly, the company believes it’s worth it in the long run.

And, hey, if they end up selling more ad-free Premium subscriptions too along the way, no harm no foul.

One user who went to the YouTube subreddit wrote:

While consumers might hate it, marketers will probably like it. The move will, of course, get in front of more eyeballs — which helps everything: the campaign learning, the cost, and the potential results.