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Advertisements playing, despite being Youtube Premium user.

Uriah
Community Member

Hello, for the past few weeks, Advertisements have begun playing on my Google Home Max, despite being a Youtube Premium user. I'll ask Google to play music on the device or group of living room devices, then after one song it will start playing an Advertisement...

I've confirmed my Google Home app is still set to use YouTube Music service to play from.
I've confirmed my subscription is very much still active, I've been sub'd for years to Google Music which gave me YT Red, which now turned into the YT Premium which Youtube Music uses.

yt
Can you tell me why I'm getting ads on Youtube Music through my nest device now? It's this how the paid service works or is something misconfigured?

3 Recommended AnswerS

Muddi
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hey folks,

 

My apologies for the lack of updates on this. Quite a few of you have been having troubles getting advertisements on Premium YouTube Music accounts when playing music on Google Home/Nest devices. Thank you to everyone who updated this thread with details on what you're experiencing.

 

To help the team further to look into this, if you could send feedback from your Google Home/Nest device using the keywords, "GHT3 Getting Ads when playing YouTube music on <ei. Nest Hub Max>" that would be great. Within your feedback report, feel free to detail what's been happening, your location and the firmware version of your device. For instructions on how to send feedback, check this out.

 

I know some of you already provided the information above within the forum post and this will be shared with the team, but having this information included in the fresh feedback sent from your device is very important.

 

I'll hop back on this thread once I have some more details to share. 

 

Cheers,

Muddi

View Recommended Answer in original post

Muddi
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hey folks,

 

No new updates to share for now but rest assured that the team is looking into this issue at hand. For those users who haven't send feedback, please do so by follow the steps below:

 

1. Turn on device usage data and crash reports:

 

  1. Open the Google Home app
  2. Select the speaker/display device card
  3. At the top-right, select Settings and then Recognition and sharing.
  4. Turn on Send [device model] device usage and crash reports to Google. (Example: Send Google Home device usage and crash reports to Google.)

Note: For iOS devices, turn on Send device usage and crash reports.

 

2. Reproduce the issue (play YouTube music) then after the issue occurred, immediately send feedback from the Nest Hub Max device by saying "OK Google, send feedback" then say the feedback keyword "GHT3 Getting Ads when playing YouTube music on <ei. Nest Hub Max>"

 

Let me know once they're done.

 

Cheers,

Muddi

View Recommended Answer in original post

Muddi
Community Specialist
Community Specialist

Hey folks,

 

Sorry for the lack of updates here. I know that this has been an ongoing issue for quite sometime now, but rest assured the team is working overtime to fix the issue.

 

We need more help as we are not getting new feedback about the issue. Please make sure to send fresh feedback from your devices once you experience the issue. This will help the team to investigate it further. Please make sure to follow the steps below on how to send feedback so the team will be able to investigate the issue further.

 

1. Turn on device usage data and crash reports:

 

  1. Open the Google Home app
  2. Select the speaker/display device card
  3. At the top-right, select Settings and then Recognition and sharing.
  4. Turn on Send [device model] device usage and crash reports to Google. (Example: Send Google Home device usage and crash reports to Google.)

Note: For iOS devices, turn on Send device usage and crash reports.

 

2. Reproduce the issue (play YouTube music) then after the issue occurred, immediately send feedback from the Nest Hub Max device by saying "OK Google, send feedback" then say the feedback keyword "GHT3 Getting Ads when playing YouTube music on <ei. Nest Hub Max>"

 

Update this thread once you send a feedback.

 

Cheers,

Muddi

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352 REPLIES 352

This is a good solution for paired speakers, but it doesn't work on my individual Nests where I am still getting ads.

Conall
Community Member

This is exactly my experience as well. I’ve been waiting a long time for a fix. I got an email from google the other day saying they were still working on and apologise blah blah blah.

Its a shame. The sound quality from a set of paired nest audios was excellent.

webdev7x6
Community Member

Edge cases can be difficult to replicate and fix. Thank you for looking into this issue and prioritizing accordingly.

Wylie
Community Member

I'm having the same problem. No solutions here, except cancel your subscription! I'm moving to Spotify. Google are entirely unhelpful. I suggest you all do the same. Spotify is the superior product anyways.

TobiasK
Community Member

check my post, likely solution found

 

trevorminer
Community Member

Just chiming in to say this issue is still ongoing and is incredibly frustrating. 

check my recent post for solution to try.

colsartoris
Community Member

I also have this problem. My account is associated with my Home app/Google Assistant; that account is associated with my speakers in the app; etc. I get short ads every few songs ONLY on my Nest Home devices. I won’t do any more troubleshooting; there are enough other services that work with Nest Home that work just fine.

pavelek
Community Member

I am having the same issue on my Google Hub device. The ads will play despite a premium subscription and correct settings. Moreover, it doesn't play my music but some random music (Indian music, Hard Rock... which has nothing to do with my taste). Spent hours with Youtube support, but they only you must install all updates on your phone 🙂 Didn't really help. I think, there is an issue in the Hub end but the number of users affected is not large enough for Google ot look into it 🙂 

brian256
Community Member

To add more voice to the problem, I've been having the exact issue described here for the past few months.

I followed @TobiasK 's suggested fix and I think it solved the problem. I had two paired minis in a speaker group. I unpaired the minis, removed one from the system, and so far have not heard any ads. 

craigpratt
Community Member

I started having this problem when coming back from vacation and casting YouTube Music to my ChromeCast Audio today.

I was getting ads (for YouTube Music) between almost every track. But at least for 12 tracks now, no ads - after doing the following (from my iphone):

  1. Open Google Home
  2. Clicked on affected speaker (should show controls and volume)
  3. Selected "Open app" (should open YouTube Music)
  4. Clicked on Account (upper right)
  5. Selected "Manage Google Account"
  6. Went to the "Data and Privacy" tab
  7. Scrolled down too "Apps and services" and selected "YouTube"
  8. Clicked on "YouTube" - which brings up a web login. Logged into the account with my YouTube Premium subscription (had to do 2-factor authentication in my case)
  9. Backed my way out to Google Home
  10. Restarted casting from YouTube Premium. No ads (so far at least)

Now, I have a sneaking suspicion that just logging onto YouTube from Safari might accomplish the same thing - as I think the issue might be related to cookies and account association/authorization related to Google Home. But I don't really have (or want to) recreate the issue to determine this. And I want to keep streaming the rest of the day to see if this is just a fluke or not. I'll follow-up with my experience either way...

 

Many thanks for detailed guide. Casting from phone with ads is not the problem mentioned in this thread. As long as you have the "Premium" title in the YouTube Music app, it won't play ads. This thread is about the ads coming when music was started with voice on the speaker or hub. And not only ads... mine seems to play some random music which has nothing to do with my taste (e.g. Indian music or Hard Rock). So it's like that it forgets your account after the first ad appears (or before it). Sometimes it needs 5-6 songs before the first ad appears. 

Yes - these are the exact same symptoms I started having (spontaneously). 

From my understanding "casting" from YT Music is not really different than initiating streaming from the Google Assistant. In both cases, the speaker is pulling the music from YT/Google servers (using your account credentials). The speaker is just taking its direction from a slightly different source. My theory is that there's an issue with the device getting/using the right credentials. This is why you can start casting a playlist from YT Music on your phone, completely turn your phone off, and have the music continue to play.

Thanks for the advice, @craigpratt. It is a messy, undesirable fix, but right now it is working for me. I casted to the Hub, and now when I use voice commands, it seems to be using the Premium account. So I think you are onto something with the credential verification being broken. I will say that I have a new phone since this stated happening; that might be a thing? Anyway, if the Google people are listening, it seems that the Nest Home is not properly attributing credentials to the hardware via the Google Home/Assistant apps (even through reboots and while the app says it has attributed the right account to the hardware), and they need to be jumpstarted by forcing the units to recognize the account by casting from a phone to work.

Anyway, thanks again. 

Allow me to disagree, @colsartoris and @craigpratt. It's not a fix 😞 The problem never appears when casting from phone manually. It is only the issue when starting music with a voice command on a speaker or hub. In particular:

- ads of local businesses and of YT Premium

- random (strange, weird, illogical) music of someone else's taste

- inability to jump back in the music list, i.e. to play a previous song (directly after the ad)

- video clips instead of music tracks (on the Hub).

I am writing this just for (unlikely) event Google People are listening to this thread - in order to provide for clarity that it is not about "casting". As well as for newcomers. 

And because @GarrettDS attempted to close this thread a few times already.

 

@pavelek - Sadly, I'm getting this issue when casting as well. Not as often, but the issue happens when I use voice command, but also when casting to all my speakers in all my rooms. I have two speakers as stereo pair in living room (nest audio) and stereo pair (nest mini 2nd gen) in kitchen and when I try to cast one song to all speakers then ads starts to play. 

@andreaseidhagen Do you mean that first you open the YT app on your phone, there you hit the 'Cast to' icon on the top, then you chose the divice(s) in a dialog box 'Cast to'? Then the music starts playing on the selected devices and occasionally the ads are coming. Did I get it right?

@pavelek I agree with you that what brought me here had nothing to do with casting; however, once I did cast a song (and had to reverify my login there), my hub now works even when not casting. Casting the one time seems to have jumpstarted my account somehow. So, yes: the problem didn’t have anything to do with casting, but (at least for me) the solution did.

Exactly. I can't redo the test now since I've packed up the speakers but if I remember it correctly it didn't play ads when I chose "Living room" but when I chose "All speakers" it played with ads (from youtube music app on iphone).

Yeah - my theory is that one of your speakers (other than "Living Room") lost the credentials that allowed it to access YTM as a Premium user - and that would prevent the whole group from streaming as Premium. 

Those are (were) my symptoms. And only on certain google devices - which is what led me to the idea of the credentials for the Premium account being lost on particular devices. 

Quick update:

Still no ads today after doing the above on the speakers that were playing ads previously. I've started playback via the YTM app and via Google Assistant to the same speakers. I'll try to test with my other speakers in the house to see if the problem manifests there. 

MexCFoo
Community Member

Same issue, new premium member.  Due to lack of useful response on this post, it's already cancelled going forward.

pavelek
Community Member

Just seeking for a cause of the problem.

There is a second YouTube-account available to me in both YouTube and YouTube Music apps. That is my old YT-account of a pre-google time, and it is linked to my Google account where the Premium subscription lays.

Does anybody have the issue but doesn't have a second YouTube-account?

tarrinr
Community Member

Same. Ads when playing on groups with speaker pairs. Support acts like it's my fault. Couldn't possibly be something on their end.

DazNoyce
Community Member

Just wondering. This isn’t anything to do with the new “Sonos” update is it? 

Quadfour
Community Member

Nope...   It's been going on for a while now.   I think it may have something to do with user accounts on YouTube or Google.

 

dzsodzso
Community Member

It's so irritating that YouTube is playing ads between videos with the YouTube Premium logo on the screen.

I'm so disappointed, Google! 

driizme
Community Member

Has there been any concrete solution to this issue? I'm unsubscribing from YouTube Music Premium at the end of this monthly cycle because I'm sick of paying for something that I can't even use.

pavelek
Community Member

Hi guys, here you go with my solution I found recently!

First, let me describe MY INITIAL CONSTELLATION:

- 1 Google home created and set up for 2 Google accounts

- 2 users (i.e. 2 Google Accounts, one for me and one for my partner)

- 2 Nest Hubs with the screen - added to my home by ANOTHER user (i.e. not by my account but rather by my partner's account) 

- 2 Nest Minis - also added to my home by ANOTHER user (i.e. not by my account... )

- 2 Android phones (mine and my partner's) with Google Home Apps, YouTube Music Apps, YouTube Apps

- 1 Premium subscription for my account

- There's no Google Family created between me and my partner, we don't want to create a family

- Because the devices were added to home by my partner's account, in the Google Home App (Device - Settings - Audio) I was unable to adjust the 'Hey Google' Sensitivity - the app clearly stated that only "a primary account" could adjust this setting. Meaning that only my partner could adjust that setting. All the other settings were available to me without restrictions. 

- As many of you did, I tried contacting YouTube Support, unsuccessful (no wonder).

I experienced the following ISSUES:

After launching YT Music with voice assistant on the speakers, the ads of local businesses and of YT Premium were coming after a few songs, and after the first ad my playlist was getting "disturbed" by music which has nothing to do with my taste (i.e. Indian music). Telling an Assistant to "like" or "dislike" a particular song did not reflect this action in my YTM App Library. All assistant queries and responses, in contrary, were getting reflected in my Assistant Activity History.

MY SOLUTION:

In Goggle Home app, first deleting all created speaker groups, and then subsequently removing each of my 4 speakers (Minis and Hubs are among them). Open a device and click the gear button, click Remove and follow instructions.

After removal, the device may still be visible in the Home App, this doesn't affect further actions. The device would still remember your settings should you decide to immediately add it back to home. 

Subsequently factory-resetting each device. Here you need to follow a specific instruction for your particular device. You can search internet for a help page with instructions, it's really easy to complete. On this step you'll lose your device settings (and probably some routines will stop working, in case they refer to a specific device). Don't worry, you won't lose a lot of settings: some wallpers on the Hub, screen brightness settings, etc. On the Mini there're not many settings per se. Your Assistant Settings and Activity History will remain untouched. Factory resetting is mandatory because it's the only way I was able to make my account a primary user (which seemingly only effects access to the Hey Google Senvisitity setting as mentioned above).

After removing all devices, I waited they to completely reboot and have added them one by one back to home in Google Home App (click Plus button - Set up device). 

In course of adding the divices, I have OPTED OUT of "Preview programme" (as these may be something untested) and added all devices one by one to the home using MY ACCOUNT and THE SAME WiFi network.

Note that I don't use Sleep Tracking on Hub, therefore I don't know if this functionality will be available in case you opt out of "Preview programme" (Device - Gear button - Device Information) . You would need to test it yourself and check if by activating Sleep Tracking you automatically opt in for "Preview programme" (Device - Gear button - Device Information).

Once added all devices back to home, tell other home members to go to their Google Home Apps and in the Assistant Settings - Hey Google & Voice Match - Other Devices - (Your Home Name) select the newly added devices by ticking them, so that their voices are getting recognized on these devices. 

Other home members should also try their routines to make sure everything they need works as expected. If necessary, update their routines, as well as do it with your personal routines. 

Create speaker groups again, if you use them.

Thats all. Worked perfectly for me. Ads gone for good, weird random music gone too, after telling to speaker to "like" a playing song, this song shows up in my Library in the YTM App.

CONCLUSION:

It's a bit unclear what exactly has resolved: the same WiFi network, resetting (which implies deleting any remaining cash), or becoming a Primary User on troublesome devices. I tend to believe that the problem was that, as YT Premium account holder, I was not simultaneously a "Primary User" of the device(s), and that in course of playing music the device was getting lost my account and switched to a default, primary account (which wasn't me).

I'm going to follow your directions, but this is a major pain for me, as I have :

2 phones (his/hers)

4 tablets

7 big nest audio

4 small nest audio

2 hub displays

3 tvs

4 chromecasts

2 chrome cast video

1 Lenovo clock

4 cameras

1 nest thermostat

So the this begs the question, just how many of my devices am i going to have to factory reset and start from scratch?

Just for what it’s worth: I just opened YouTube Music on my phone (logged on as the same user that I have on my Hub) and cast to the Hub in my kitchen. Now it works on all my Nests. 

so i have no ads, its my wife whos in my family group, i tried with her phone to cast to a hub, and let it go for several songs, then i stopped it and got my wife to ask it for music....advertisement before music even starts

but thx

@ShadowWulf

Hi! I suggest you ungroup one Hub (remove it from all groups) and perform a factory reset on it. Set it up and connect it to your regular WiFi network you're using for your phone. Keep in mind, that the first set up will may take you some more time to read through each setting that is being asked. But the subsequent devices you'll complete much faster because you will be clicking without thinking on it again 🙂

Before testing YTMusic on the first refreshed device, do not instruct your household partner to add this particular device for their voice match, however make sure that you are allowing your voice to be recognized on that device (in the assistant settings).

It is essential that the account adding the "new" device is the same account you're having subscribtion with. Then you'll become a "primary user" on that device. 

If it works for a day or so without glitching and ads, you can then proceed with other devices, create groups again and tell your partner to allow their voice recognition on "new" devices.

Wish you luck 😁

My concern is that while I'm currently the primary and my wife is the secondary, she is the only one who gets the ads. If we swap then maybe I'll get the ads and i use the music 10 times as much as she does.   however considering how angry my wife is getting i may just do that. 

now does it matter if im the primary who has the account under my email address?

 

thanks for your response!!!!

@ShadowWulf I know how that hurts and how much time and nerves does it take to try out all that stuff in various combinations.. . So, you're welcome 🙂 

Casting from phone was never an issue for the dominating majority on this forum. And I believe that the minority who claims they get ads while casting from phone, either really use wrong account or confuse terminology...

Now, casting from phone means that if there are no ads on the phone, there will be non on the speaker. Because it will use YTMusic App music controls and account credentials, so to say. 

Launching the imbedded YT Music app on the Speaker with a voice assistant, however, results in a problem. Because there will be an account mismatch with the "primary account". That is to my best guess.

It's a usual situation in many households and it seems simply to have not been properly tested by Google, YouTube or whoever developed the app for the speaker. That is why I additionally made sure I am opted out from "Preview features" on all devices.

I think, the can resolve this issue very-very easily, they just don't know about its existence, and there won't be anybody to tell them.... Because the Support runs you through all that nightmare with updates, etc - according to their standard response texts - and they are not in a position to provide any technical judgment. They are just a call center... A chat-center... in the best case people who work nights from India for 2 dollars a night... 🙄 Maximum they can do is to log your query and send it into nowhere in Amerika.

Therefore, you might want to try proving a hypothesis: reset and set up one Hub (in order to have a benefit of seeing whose voice has been recognized) from your wife's phone (who is currently getting ads). If she stops getting ads on "her" Hub, tell her to ask "her" Hub (make sure other speakers can't hear the query) to play music on one of "not her" devices, where she is not a primary. E. g. she's standing in the kitchen asking the Kitchen Hub to play music in sleeping room XYZ. Effectively, this should count as casting, and she shouldn't get ads on a "foreign" speaker. Just like as she wouldn't when she's casting from her phone.

After that you can enable "her" Hub to recognize your voice too, and try if the issue persists when you ask it. If resolved for both you and wife, just reset the rest of devices and open a bottle of sparkling wine to celebrate victory ! 😂

PS. You can also ask Google to send feedback and calmly dictate your issue. Maybe it's a better channel than the customer support.

thanks very much for this well written answer and the time you've taken to try and help. I'll do that tomorrow, I've used up my daily allotment of energy, i have a couple different genetic diseases that kick my butt. I've pushed myself to the edge by shovelling rthe driveway and my hands and fingets are toast.  thx again!

 

Just for the record, I want to be perfectly clear here: I was getting ads *not* while casting from my phone; I was getting ads on the Nests when I was using voice commands. Happened every time. My account was correct -- even had my little picture in the top right hand corner and the Nest would say my name when I asked it to. So the Nest had the correct account that should have been associated with my YouTube Premium account; however, I still got ads when using voice commands. I got no ads at all on the phone. The problem of the Nest playing ads ONLY occurred when I was using voice commands on it. What fixed that problem for me was *ta-da* casting YouTube from my phone to my Nest just once. After that, it seemed to sync up the accounts properly, and now when I use *voice commands* on the Nest, it works just fine. (So, to be clear: I am not casting from my phone every time. I only did it once.)

My point in this thread is not that it will fix it for everyone; my point is it was a super-simple fix and takes like a minute to try to see if it works for you.

Indeed, it makes me wonder if you can make the Hub recognize your wife (mine knows the difference between my wife's and my face, for example) and have her try to cast from her Premium Account from her phone to the Hub. Again: This might not work for her, but it is such a simple thing to try. 

@colsartoris True, it costs nothing to try 🙂 And I'd like to note here that previously the ads were coming for me sometimes even after 30 or 60 mins of initially ad-free steaming (talking about voice-activated). After the first add (or just prior to that) it was "forgetting" who it's playing for, and was starting playing some weird music. In many other cases the ads were coming first thing after starting...

My point is that you better give it a try to play really long to confirm that you won 😅

PS. I was referring to a so-called "primary user". That is a user who had set up the device very initially with his/her Google Home App on the phone. This has nothing to do with the voice assistant and voice recognition apparently. The name of primary user isn't written in the settings but if you can adjust the Hey Google Sensitivity level, you're a primary. If it's greyed out, then somebody else is the primary. I can't guarantee, though, that I am to 100% correct about all the details and that I don't misinterpret some of them 😊