YouTube Premium is a paid subscription plan for YouTube that unlocks several benefits.
Some of these benefits include ad-free streaming, the ability to download videos, and the capability to play videos in the background.
If you’re tired of ads interrupting your watching experience, you may want to consider subscribing to YouTube Premium.
However, you also may be unsure of how much it costs.
How Much Is YouTube Premium?
YouTube Premium has three different price plans.
For individuals, you can expect to pay $11.99 a month.
However, you also have the option of buying an annual plan for a discounted price of $119.99 per year.
YouTube Premium also offers a family plan for $22.99 a month.
Finally, the student plan costs $6.99 a month.
What Does The YouTube Premium Family Plan Include?
If you want to enjoy YouTube Premium but don’t want to pay the cost by yourself, you might be interested in purchasing the Family Plan.
The Family Plan includes several benefits that the other two plans don’t offer.
For example, under the Family Plan, you’re able to add up to five members aged 13 or older who reside in your household to the plan.
If some of those members are adults, you can easily share the cost among them.
Another benefit of the Family Plan is that everyone can have their own profiles.
To make your profile, you’ll need to either sign in to an existing Google account or create a new one.
The primary account holder is then responsible for adding the Google accounts that count toward the household.
To access your profile, you simply use YouTube while your Google account is active.
You can then enjoy all of the benefits of YouTube Premium while using your profile.
With your profile, you can ensure that your recommended videos are personalized to you and not that of another family member
The Family Plan also includes a few other additional benefits.
One benefit is access to YouTube Music Premium and the ability to enjoy downloading and listening to music without interruptions.
Additionally, users of the family plan can access Primetime Channels that the family manager purchases.
Family members can also purchase their own Primetime Channels, which won’t be shared by anyone else in the family plan.
Clearly, YouTube Premium’s Family Plan has a lot to offer families.
What Does The YouTube Premium Student Plan Include?
If you’re more interested in the Student Plan from YouTube Premium, then you may wonder what that includes.
The Student Plan is only available to eligible students and requires annual verification.
YouTube does take its student verification a bit more seriously than some other websites.
As such, faking a student account isn’t that easy.
As such, once you graduate and lose your student status, you will no longer be eligible for the Student Plan
But, if you do qualify, then you receive the same benefits as an individual plan such as being able to enjoy ad-free videos and the ability to download videos.
However, the Student Plan comes with an additional benefit, its price.
After your one-month free trial, you only have to pay $6.99 a month.
That’s significantly cheaper than the Individual Plan.
With the Student Plan, you’re able to access all the features of YouTube Premium at a lower price.
How Do You Qualify For The YouTube Premium Student Plan?
Since the YouTube Premium Student Plan has a discounted price, it does have some strict qualifications.
If you don’t qualify, then you’re not going to be able to receive the discounted rate.
One of the qualifications that you need to meet is that you need to be a full-time student.
If you’re a part-time student, you are not eligible for the Student Plan.
You also have to be a student from an eligible country.
YouTube Premium isn’t available in every country of the world.
However, if you’re a student in the United States, you are eligible provided you’re attending a higher education institution.
The membership is then valid for four years.
However, you still have to verify that you’re a student at the end of each year.
If you’re able to do so, your membership receives a renewal.
If you’re not eligible anymore, YouTube will invite you to sign up for the Individual Plan instead.
How Can You Save Money On YouTube Premium?
Since YouTube Premium can seem quite expensive to some people, you may be wondering about some ways you can save money.
Here are a few methods you can use to make YouTube Premium a bit cheaper.
1. Cost Share
One of the best ways to save money on YouTube Premium is to share the cost with others.
Even though the Family Plan suggests sharing the account with your family, that doesn’t need to be the case.
You can easily share it with friends, too.
Since everyone links to the plan with their Google accounts, it doesn’t matter who uses that account.
For example, if you have a bunch of friends who want to enjoy YouTube Premium, you can share the cost.
The Family Plan costs $22.99 a month.
Even if you only have two other friends to share the cost with, that’d make your monthly plan cost $7.66 per person.
You’re able to have up to five people on one Family Plan.
If you share that cost with everyone, that brings down the monthly payment to $4.59.
That’s even cheaper than the student discount.
Of course, you could also take turns paying the cost of the Family Plan
For example, one friend can pay $22.99 one month, then another friend the next month, and so on.
Either way, sharing the cost with others can make YouTube Premium a lot cheaper.
2. Utilize Your Student Status
If you’re a student, the best way to save money is to use that status for as long as possible.
YouTube isn’t the only platform that offers discounts to students.
As such, keeping your student status active for as long as possible can help you reap some benefits.
Since the Student Plan has a discounted price on it, you’re essentially saving money through virtue of being a student alone.
Even if you’re not a student, you might have a sibling, child, or friend who is.
With some negotiation, you might be able to encourage them to let you use their credentials to enjoy the Student Plan.
3. Share The Individual Plan
The Individual Plan for YouTube Premium is for singles.
However, that doesn’t mean you need to use it for just one person.
It’s a bit more convenient that way, but you can use it to share the cost with others.
The disadvantage of using an Individual Plan over a Family Plan to share the costs is that you’re unable to attach different accounts to the plan.
This means that your recommended videos might be a bit of a mess if everyone using the account has different tastes in entertainment.
To share an Individual Plan account, the primary account holder will need to share their login details.
This can be a bit risky, so it’s better to use this option only with those you absolutely trust.
Then they can log in and enjoy the benefits of YouTube Premium, too.
If you split it halfway with another person, your monthly payments end up becoming $5.99 instead of $11.99.
If you share your account with another person, it becomes even cheaper.
As long as you don’t mind messy recommended videos and the other people using your account to subscribe to channels, then this is another method you can use to save money on YouTube Premium.
4. Use The YouTube Website
Another way to save money on YouTube Premium is to use the YouTube website instead of the app.
This is especially useful for those who want to use YouTube Premium on their iPhones.
The Apple Store charges all apps a certain fee to let them access their app store.
Because YouTube has to pay a fee to put its app on Apple’s store, they charge a higher amount of money for those who use YouTube Premium via Apple’s app store.
The best way to save money for Apple users is to ditch the app store and just use the website to sign up for and pay for YouTube Premium.
Since you’re using the website and not the app that comes with a fee, you’re able to get a cheaper version of YouTube Premium.
It may only be a few dollars that you save using this method, but those savings can add up quickly.
If you have an Apple device, you should use the YouTube website to avoid higher prices.
What Are The Benefits of Using YouTube Premium?
Considering that YouTube, itself, is free, you may wonder what the benefits are of using YouTube Premium.
Here are a few benefits that YouTube Premium offers over normal Youtube.
1. No Ads
Perhaps the biggest benefit of YouTube Premium is that you no longer have your videos interrupted by ads.
Considering that YouTube has been experimenting with longer ads, and even ads that are no longer skippable, it’s clear that they’re trying to push viewers to YouTube Premium.
Few people have the patience to sit through 60 seconds of ads on YouTube for every video.
They’re used to ads that last no longer than five seconds before they’re able to skip them.
If YouTube follows through and makes 60-second unskippable ads the new norm, it might make paying for YouTube Premium worth the additional cost.
2. Downloads
Another benefit of YouTube Premium is the ability to download videos.
If you know you’re going to be without internet service for a while, being able to download some videos to watch during that time is a wonderful feature.
This is a feature offered to those who pay for YouTube Premium.
3. Music Library
YouTube has two paid subscription services.
You can either pay for YouTube Music or YouTube Premium.
If you pay for YouTube Premium, you also get YouTube Music access.
It has a huge library of music that you’re able to listen to without ads.
If listening to music is something you love to do, this might be a great benefit for you.
Conclusion
YouTube Premium has three different prices for its viewers.
Depending on your situation, you might be able to use one of these plans to your advantage to save some money.
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