YouTube Shorts, Videos Will Have Fewer but Longer Ads on TV

Longer viewing sessions of YouTube Shorts can soon be enjoyed on Connected TV screens, albeit with a few caveats.

Google announced that non-YouTube Premium users will soon have YouTube Shorts on the big screen at the price of fewer but longer ad breaks.

The tech giant said the transition will help provide a more "seamless viewing experience" for those who cannot afford their Premium subscriptions.

Instead of guessing how many ad breaks to suffer every five minutes, a timer will appear to tell viewers how long they have to wait before the ad break is done or can be skipped.

Viewers can still skip the ads through their TV remote to click away the skippable ads.

Google assured that the ad rolls on the TV version are supposed to be "consistent" with those in the mobile app.

The changes are apparently brought to reduce disruptions when watching long-form videos on the platform.

YouTube Research Shows People Prefer Longer Ads than Frequent Short Breaks

Google's decision to implement the changes was brought into consideration by the recent YouTube study on what most viewers prefer when receiving advertisements on the platform.

Survey results have shown that 79% of the respondents chose video ads that are grouped together rather than scattered throughout the main content.

The results were backed by testing that many viewers have 29% longer viewing sessions on minute-long ads compared to the previous 5- to 10-second breaks.

Google and YouTube conducted the testing in September.

YouTube New Strategy on Connected TV Streaming

Despite being almost a year now since it was implemented on Connected TVs, this was the first time Google announced that it would finally add advertisements on YouTube Shorts.

The policy changes have been brought by the 100% growth of YouTube Shorts watchers on TV from January to September this year.

The inclusion of ad rolls on Shorts will allow Google to allow advertisers to seamlessly tap into the market via YouTube Select Shorts, First Position on Shorts, and Trending Music.

TikTok has a similar structure on how ads appear on its site, although not with the same duration Google intends to do.