Apple may first roll out an ad-supported option in the UK

Apple has long been rumored to be in talks with various ad agencies in an effort to bring some level of advertising to its Apple TV+ service. While the service remains ad-free currently, this could be changing — at least in the UK.

The company is reported to have held discussions with the UK-based Broadcaster's Audience Research Board (BARB). Executives from Apple are said to have met with the group to explore the extra data-collection techniques needed to monitor advertising results.

Currently, BARB provides viewing statistics for all four main networks in the UK: the BBC, ITV, Channel 4, and Fox-owned Sky. The organization also provides Apple with viewing figures for Apple TV+ programming.

The new meeting suggests that Apple is preparing to offer an ad-supported tier to Apple TV+. There were similar meetings with ratings organizations in the US in 2022, but thus far nothing has come of those.

Apple has already accommodated limited advertising on its service, but thus far it has been limited to live sports events. Ads were included in last year's Major League Soccer coverage, for example, even for Season Pass holders.

The company is also said to have reduced its spending on Apple TV+ after having spent some $20 billion on programming thus far. Other services, including Disney+ and Netflix, have attracted additional subscribers through lower-cost, ad-supported tier offerings.

Apple recently hired an advertising executive formerly with NBCUniversal to join a team of other video advertising executives. It seems likely that Apple will eventually offer a lower-cost option that includes ads, alongside the current ad-free tier, in countries where the service is available.

10 Comments

lotones 105 comments · 12 Years

About 3 months ago

dammit. Inevitable, but... dammit. :(

chasm 3595 comments · 10 Years

lotones said:

dammit. Inevitable, but... dammit. :(

Agreed, but this should mean that we ad-free subscribers pay the same price we are paying now. So, no change for us. I'm okay with that, and with Apple TV+ getting more subscribers who have to watch ads I don't have to watch. :smile:

elijahg 2823 comments · 18 Years

Don't be so sure this isn't adding ads to *all* tiers. News+ has ads, so why not AppleTV+?

Apple filling everything with ads really devalues Apple's brand; especially since there is data collection going on which is the antithesis to privacy. Steve tried baked in ads once way back in 1997 with Sherlock, it went down like a lead balloon and he vowed never to do it again. Cook of course is so obsessed with profit above all else that he's willing to devalue the brand and piss off paying subscribers by stuffing ads everywhere.

I mentioned previously that I unsubbed from Apple News+ partly because of the ads, which meant I also dropped Apple One as it was no longer worth it. Apple went from getting £450 per year to £109 for Apple Music only, just so they could make a couple of cents from some shitty ads.

davidmalcolm 402 comments · 9 Years

The ads in the App Store and Apple News+ are bad enough (honestly I tend to use Feedly more than News+ for that reason.) if ads start creeping into Music and TV+ they I can just switch over the pirating those. At this point TV+ is the only streaming service I still bother paying for. But I will not go back to constant advertising.

Ads are for people too stupid to figure out how to get around them. I have better things to do.

charlesn 1154 comments · 11 Years

elijahg said:

Don't be so sure this isn't adding ads to *all* tiers. News+ has ads, so why not AppleTV+?

Here's why: ads in all tiers would really damage Apple TV+ competitive position vs. other major streamers, and it already has the fewest subscribers, despite offering a fairly low price for the quality of its content. Even though the ad-supported plans on other streamers are much cheaper than ad-free, the ad-free plans remain more popular AND have less churn than the ad-supported tier. So "ads for everyone" would kill off the more desired ad-free tier--while hugely pissing off ALL current Apple TV+ subscribers in the process--and that's not exactly a great plan for growing Apple's streaming TV business. That said, I would bet the ad-free tier will become more expensive if and when Apple decides to launch an ad-supported plan to go with it.