YouTube Premium is one of many paid YouTube services and shares a portion of its name with YouTube Music Premium. It’s not the only subscription either, since you can subscribe to a YouTube channel as a member. Moreover, YouTube Premium accounts get visual or functional benefits, including Super Chat or Super Stickers, and access to exclusive content such as original production of movies or TV shows. This is all fine and dandy when things work as intended. It is only when they take a turn for the worse, likely in a flash, that you inquire about how to restore a YouTube Premium or subscription. Luckily, you now have us to help you.
Note. We’ll cover most of, if not all paid YouTube services at once. They share recovery options because of YouTube’s efforts at streamlining fast and satisfying responses. We also suggest treating this as a step-by-step guide, not a list of independent methods.
1. Check the YouTube Purchases section
Our first step is a logical one. It, unsurprisingly, includes checking the Purchases section of your YouTube account:
- Visit YouTube’s Purchases page and sign in if you haven’t.
- You’ll see a list of all paid memberships.
- Note. This includes being a channel member or for YouTube Premium and YouTube Music, and, if it exists, YouTube TV and individual movie/TV show purchases.
- Look through the details and establish what’s missing.
- Tip. This is a great way to identify an expired subscription you might have forgotten to refresh.
2. Restore YouTube Premium or subscription by reporting unauthorized purchases
Do you suspect your YouTube account was compromised, and someone else canceled a subscription? First, make sure to recover your YouTube account so that you, and you only, have access. Then, do the following:
- Open your e-mail account client.
- Look for legit messages from paid YouTube services. The official ones appear as “GOOGLE*YouTube <service>” on the statement. For example, GOOGLE*YouTube Premium.
- If you notice a suspicious e-mail and you’ve enabled quick purchases in the past, YouTube recommends that you re-enable purchase verification like this:
- Click on your profile picture.
- Go to Settings, then Billing & payments.
- Click on Disable quick purchases.
- Now that you’ve secured the account against further misuse, if the person made charges you want to be refunded, skip to method 5.
- Otherwise, let YouTube know about the occurrence by filing out an unauthorized purchase claim up to 120 days after the transaction.
- Put a checkmark in front of the payment method used, then tick the box in front of “By checking this box, I verify that I did not authorize the purchase(s) that I reported in this form.”
- Click on the Submit button.
- Keep checking your claim status.
3. Ask the YouTube Help Community
There’s always a possibility that you don’t need to recover YouTube Premium or a subscription. Temporary problems with payment processors or your payment method, YouTube channels or your account, or automatic unsubscribing or status loss caused by the algorithm are all part of the deal. The best way to check is to get reach out to the Google YouTube Community by searching for a solution or posting a question.
4. Recover YouTube Premium or subscription via Support
We talked about contacting YouTube Support multiple times, most notably in method 3 of recovering a YouTube channel. Although you can do this while skipping the rest of the methods, for best results, we recommend you go through with them while waiting for a response. You can also watch the videos on the YouTube Viewers channel.
5. Restore YouTube Premium or subscription by requesting a refund
Although you can report and cancel a paid subscription at any moment and simply resubscribe, you might struggle to get your money back. Additionally, not all memberships or paid activities on YouTube are refundable. Some examples of that are donations, Super Stickers, Super Chat, or Super Thanks. With that said, here are 2 ways to restore YouTube Premium or subscription:
1. Individual requests
Refunding individual actions made on your YouTube account depends on the device:
- Desktop: Visit the YouTube Purchases page above. Click on the item you want to refund, then select Problem with a purchase? After clicking on Request a refund, click on Confirm.
- Android: In the YouTube App, tap on your profile picture. Go to Purchases and memberships, then Purchases. Proceed in the same fashion as above.
- iPhone/iPad: If you purchased the item through Apple, you must get in touch with Apple Support to get a refund.
2. YouTube Premium and YouTube TV
To get a refund for your YouTube Premium or YouTube Music Premium subscription, head on over to the YouTube Premium Refund page. If you bought a YouTube TV subscription, visit the YouTube TV Refunds page. In both cases, you must click on one of the square boxes, and follow on-screen instructions. Once again, if you bought it via iTunes, iPhone, iPad, or Apple TV, reach out to Apple’s Support for help.
