On YouTube, there are ads that users can skip after a few seconds, and there are some that users have no choice but to sit through. Last month Snapchat announced something similar where they were planning on testing out unskippable ads, and now in a report from AdAge, those ads have started to roll out.
According to reports, these unskippable ads have started to make their rounds where the first few ads spotted were to promote movies such as Deadpool 2 and Adrift, along with products like the Samsung Galaxy S9 and Snappable. These ads will run for 6 seconds and are unskippable, although to be fair 6 seconds isn’t particularly long.
Note that these ads only appear in Shows and is a huge change for the company who had previously allowed users to skip ads immediately, resulting in average view times of just under 2 seconds. This change reportedly comes from pressure from brands who weren’t particularly thrilled about the way Snapchat handled ads, so hopefully this change will appease them.
That being said, one has to wonder if this change to Snapchat’s ad format will be applied to other apps and services as well. Instagram has introduced ads to its Stories which are completely skippable, but like we said, Snapchat’s change could prompt Instagram to follow suit.