How to Cancel YouTube Premium (and Any YouTube Subscription)

YouTube Premium does not prorate. When you cancel, the official policy is that your membership simply runs to the end of the period you've already paid for — there is no automatic partial refund for the unused days.

If an unwanted renewal has just hit your card, request a refund at pay.google.com: open the YouTube Premium transaction and choose Report a problem. Google reviews these case by case, and the request is far more likely to succeed within a day or two of the charge, on an account that hasn't watched anything since.

If Apple billed you — that is, you subscribed inside the YouTube iOS app — Google cannot refund you at all. Use reportaproblem.apple.com instead, which is a separate process with its own 90-day window.

Annual Premium plans are the one case worth pushing on, since a forgotten $159.99 renewal is worth the ten minutes. A card chargeback is a last resort: Google may lock the payment profile on your Google account, which breaks Play Store purchases and every other Google subscription you have.

After cancelling, you will retain your YouTube Premium benefits through the end of your current billing cycle. You will not be charged again, and your access to ad-free videos, background play, and YouTube Music will be revoked at the start of the next cycle. Your viewing history, playlists, and subscriptions remain intact, but offline downloads will be removed from your device once the subscription officially expires.

If you are looking to save money, consider switching to the YouTube Premium Family Plan to share the $26.99 monthly cost with up to 5 household members. Alternatively, if your primary goal is music, consider standalone services like Spotify or Apple Music, which offer ad-free streaming at a lower price point than the full YouTube Premium bundle.

One clarification worth making, because it is an expensive mistake: YouTube Premium and YouTube TV are separate products with separate bills. Premium is $15.99/mo and strips ads from ordinary YouTube; YouTube TV is $82.99/mo for the Base Plan and is a live television service. Cancelling one leaves the other charging you. If the live TV bill is what you meant to stop, follow how to cancel YouTube TV instead.

• Apple App Store Surcharge: If you signed up within the YouTube iOS mobile app, Apple's 30% billing surcharge applies, raising the Individual rate to $22.99/mo. You must cancel through your Apple Device settings.
• June 2026 Price Hike: Note that pricing for standard plans has been increased to $15.99/mo for Individuals and $26.99/mo for Families.
• Check if you are billed through a cellular partner or carrier bundle (like T-Mobile or Google Fi); cancelling paid membership via YouTube will not affect mobile billing if managed externally.
• Verify grandfathered rates: If you have active Premium Lite plans ($8.99/mo) or older promo rates, you will forfeit this pricing tier permanently upon deactivation.
• Offline downloads: Ensure you check or verify your device data, as all downloaded videos will be automatically removed once membership expires.