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What is YouTube Premium Lite? All you need to know about YouTube’s cheaper plan


YouTube introduced a more affordable subscription tier in the US last year called YouTube Premium Lite, offering viewers a cheaper way to watch most videos without ads. The plan is designed for people who mainly use YouTube to watch videos and want a less interrupted viewing experience without paying for the full YouTube Premium bundle.

At launch, Premium Lite focused on one core benefit: removing ads from most videos. Since then, YouTube has updated the plan with additional features that were previously exclusive to the full Premium subscription.

With ads becoming harder to avoid on YouTube, more viewers are starting to consider paying for a subscription. If YouTube Premium Lite is on your radar, here’s everything you need to know about the plan, including how much it costs, what features it includes, and how it compares to the standard Premium plan.

What’s included with YouTube Premium Lite?

YouTube Premium Lite is designed to reduce ads across much of the platform. The subscription offers an ad-free experience on most creator-led content and YouTube Kids videos. However, ads can still appear on music content such as official music videos, covers, and dance videos, as well as on YouTube Shorts and while browsing or searching on the platform.

YouTube Premium and Premium Lite features overview.
YouTube

The plan received a significant upgrade in February 2026 when YouTube added two features that were previously limited to the full Premium subscription: background playback and offline downloads. Background playback keeps videos playing when you switch apps or lock your screen, while offline downloads allows you to save videos to watch later without an active internet connection. Both features work across most non-music content, excluding Shorts.

These additions make Premium Lite better value for viewers who watch a lot of content on their phones or tablets, especially when they want to listen to videos while multitasking or save them for travel. Even with the update, the plan still lacks several features available with the full YouTube Premium plan.

What’s missing from YouTube Premium Lite?

In addition to ads still appearing on music content, YouTube Shorts, and while browsing or searching on the platform, YouTube Premium Lite also does not include several other benefits offered with the standard tier.

One of the key exclusions is YouTube Music Premium, so music playback on YouTube and in the YouTube Music app still has ads. The Lite tier also misses fan favorite playback features, like Jump Ahead, queuing, and Continue Watching.

Other notable omissions include Picture-in-Picture mode, Premium playback controls, 1080p Premium video quality, 256 kbps audio quality, Smart Downloads, and early access to new features. Because of these limitations, Premium Lite is priced significantly lower than the full Premium plan.

How much does YouTube Premium Lite cost, and where is it available?

In the US, YouTube Premium Lite is priced at $7.99 per month. In contrast, the standard YouTube Premium subscription costs $13.99 per month for an individual plan.

Premium Lite is also available in Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, France, Germany, Great Britain, India, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Philippines, Poland, Romania, Singapore, South Korea, Spain, Taiwan, Thailand, and Turkey, with prices varying by region.

It’s important to note that, unlike the full Premium subscription, Premium Lite currently does not offer family, multi-person, or student plans, which may limit options for households and students. YouTube also doesn’t offer prepaid annual plans for Premium Lite.

Like the full Premium plan, Premium Lite works across multiple devices, including phones, tablets, laptops, and smart TVs, as long as users are signed in with their Google account.

Should you sign up for YouTube Premium Lite?

YouTube Premium Lite is ideal if you mainly watch videos on YouTube and want a smoother, ad-free experience without paying for all the extra features included with the standard Premium plan. It’s especially great for those who consume a lot of content on phones or tablets, want to listen to podcasts while multitasking, or save videos to watch offline during travel or commutes.

Premium Lite also offers a low-cost way for new subscribers to experience YouTube without ads and decide whether upgrading to the full Premium plan is worthwhile. Since the plan also includes ad-free YouTube Kids content, it can be a good option for households with young children.

However, if your watch history mainly consists of official music videos, song covers, dance videos, or Shorts, Premium Lite isn’t the right plan. In that case, you should go with the standard Premium plan, as it offers ad-free viewing across all types of content.

How to sign up for YouTube Premium Lite?

If the features and pricing above have convinced you that YouTube Premium Lite is worth trying, signing up is quick and easy. Simply navigate to youtube.com/premiumlite on mobile or desktop, select “Get Premium Lite,” sign in with your Google account, enter your payment information, and confirm your subscription.

Premium Lite features, including ad-free viewing in most videos, background playback, and offline downloads, will be activated immediately.

How to upgrade or cancel your YouTube Premium Lite subscription?

You can cancel your Premium Lite subscription anytime by navigating to youtube.com/paid_memberships. On the memberships page, select “Manage membership,” then choose “Deactivate,” click “Continue,” select your reason for canceling, and confirm to cancel your subscription.

If you enjoy the ad-free experience and want to switch to the full Premium plan for additional benefits, you can upgrade by navigating to youtube.com/paid_memberships. On the memberships page, select “Learn more” under Premium, choose “Get YouTube Premium” to pick your new Premium plan, and then confirm to upgrade.



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I changed this overlooked setting and instantly improved Spotify’s audio quality


Spotify aims to provide a consistent listening experience that uses minimal data. As a result, your audio quality might be less than ideal, especially if you’re using a pair of high-fidelity headphones or high-end speakers. Here’s how to fix that.

Switch audio streaming quality to Very High or Lossless

The default audio streaming quality in both the mobile and desktop Spotify apps is set to Automatic, which usually keeps the audio quality at Normal, which is only 96 Kbps. Even though Spotify uses the Ogg Vorbis codec, which is superior to MP3, OGG files exhibit slight (but noticeable) digital noise, poor bass detail, dull treble, and a narrow soundstage at 96 Kbps.

Even worse, Spotify is aggressive about adjusting the automatic bitrate. Even though 4G is more than fast enough to stream high-quality OGG files, even with a weak signal, Spotify may still drop the quality to Low, which has a bitrate of just 24 Kb/s. You will notice such a sharp drop in quality, even on a pair of bottom-of-the-barrel headphones.

To rectify this, open the Spotify app, tap your user image, open “Settings and privacy,” and tap the “Media Quality” menu. Once there, set Wi-Fi streaming quality and cellular streaming quality to “Very high” or “Lossless.”

I recommend setting cellular streaming quality to Very high and reserving Lossless for Wi-Fi, since lossless streaming is very data-intensive. One hour of streaming lossless files can take up to 1GB of data, as well as a good chunk of your phone’s storage, because Spotify caches files you’re frequently streaming. Besides, you’ll struggle to notice the difference unless you’re listening to music on a wired pair of high-end headphones or speakers; wireless connection just doesn’t have the bandwidth needed to convey the full fidelity of Spotify lossless audio.

You might opt for High quality if you have a capped data plan, but I recommend doing so only if you stream hours upon hours’ worth of music every single day over a cellular network. For instance, I burn through about 8 GB of data per month on average while streaming about two hours of very high-quality music over a cellular network each day.

Illustration of a headphone with various music icons around.


How Audio Compression Works and Why It Can Affect Your Music Quality

Feeling the squeeze when listening to your favorite song?

Set audio download quality to Very high or Lossless

If you tend to download songs and albums for offline listening, you should also set the audio download quality to “Very high” or “Lossless.” This setting is located just under the audio streaming quality section.

The audio download quality menu in Spotify's mobile app.

If you’ve got enough free storage on your phone, opt for the latter, but if you’d rather save storage space, set it to Very high. You’ll hardly hear the difference, but lossless files are about five times larger than the 320 Kb/s OGG files Spotify offers at its Very high quality setting, and they can quickly fill up your phone’s storage.

Adjust video streaming quality at your discretion

The last section of the Media quality menu is Video streaming quality. This sets the quality of video podcasts and music videos available for certain songs. Since I care about neither, I set it to “Very high” on Wi-Fi and “Normal” on cellular, but you should tweak the two options at your discretion because songs sound notably better at higher video streaming quality levels.

If you often watch videos over cellular and have unlimited data, feel free to toggle video quality to very high.

Make sure Data Saver mode is disabled

Even if your audio quality is set to Very high or Lossless, Spotify will switch to low-quality streaming if the app’s Data saver mode is enabled. This option is located in the Data saving and offline menu. Open the menu, then set it to “Always off,” or choose “Automatic” to have Spotify’s Data Saver mode kick in alongside your phone’s Data Saver mode.

You can also enable volume normalization and play around with the built-in equalizer

Spotify logo in the center of the screen with an equalizer in front. Credit: Lucas Gouveia / How-To Geek

Last but not least, there are two additional features you can play with to improve your listening experience. The first is volume normalization, which sets the same loudness for every track you’re listening to. This can be handy because different albums are mastered at different loudness levels, with newer music usually being louder.

Since I’m an album-oriented listener, I keep the option disabled. I can just play an album and set the audio volume accordingly, and I don’t really mind louder songs when listening to playlists, artists, or song radios.

But if you can’t stand one song being quiet and the next rattling the windows, visit the Playback menu, enable “Volume normalization,” and set it to “Quiet” or “Normal.” The “Loud” option can digitally compress files, and neither Spotify nor I recommend using it. This also happens with “Quiet” and “Normal,” since both adjust the decibel level of the master recording for each song, but the compression level is much lower and extremely hard to notice.

Before I end this, I should also mention that you can access the equalizer directly from the Spotify app, where you can fine-tune your music listening experience or pick one of the available equalizer presets. If your phone has a built-in equalizer, Spotify will open it; if it doesn’t, you can use Spotify’s. On my phone (a Samsung Galaxy S21 FE), I can only use One UI’s built-in equalizer.

To open the equalizer, open “Playback,” then hit the “Equalizer” button. Now you can equalize your audio to your heart’s content.

Adjusting just a few settings can have a drastic impact on your Spotify listening experience. If you aren’t satisfied with Spotify’s sound quality, make sure to adjust the audio before jumping ship. You should also check the sound quality settings from time to time, as Spotify can reset them during app updates.​​​​​​​

Three phones with a Spotify screen and the logo in the center.


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