I was on YouTube one night, and it suggested that I could try Premium for $0 for a month, and I thought it was a good opportunity to see if it was actually worth it. A few days later, it turned out that I actually watched YouTube videos a lot more than usual, and the premium features contributed to that.

I normally use YouTube frequently. With these new features that come with Premium, I find being on YouTube a little more convenient.

The most important thing about YouTube Premium is that I don't get ads. Without premium, you are going to see a lot of ads here and there in a single video, especially if that video is long. And you may not be able to skip some of these ads sometimes. It can be annoying, but there's nothing you can do about it without Premium, so you just get used to it.

Having been on premium for days now, I am only just realising at this moment of writing that I really have not been seeing ads all this while, and that has allowed me to be less distracted when I am watching. So I am more likely to finish a video that way.

Background playback is the most handy feature that comes with the premium. It has now become very convenient for me to multitask while I watch videos. I don't have to split my screen to do other things on my phone while I watch YouTube videos, which could limit other apps' functionalities. And there are a few controls, too.

Quality video downloads. On freemium, you can only download videos in 480p. That's not great quality. I prefer my videos at 1080p and above, so that's why I'd rather stream than download videos. On premium, I get to download in full HD (1080p) resolution.

There's Smart Downloads on premium, too, but the concept doesn't make much sense to me. I don't want YouTube to "automatically download recommendations" for me. I may not be interested in whatever it thinks I would like or have it use up so much storage space on my phone.

I get to "line up what to watch" by adding videos to a queue. This is very useful, as I get to streamline my watch and keep things focused.

Premium controls come with some fancy features that improve my watching experience. It brings up the necessary controls for convenient and quick access to them.

Stable volume, you'll find in the premium controls, "balances the range between quiet and loud, continuously adjusting volume levels to reduce variations in sound." I didn't particularly care much about this feature, but I guess it could come in handy in certain videos with unbalanced audio. It's only available on the mobile app, though.

Lastly, ambient mode. When this feature is on, the phone's screen around the video glows up and changes colour based on the video's visual output. It's subtle, but nice-looking. I am not sure if this works on all screens, though, but I know that it works on AMOLED and OLED screens, which includes most Android and iPhone models out there today. It works on my PC, too.

Surprisingly, it costs 1,100 naira for YouTube Premium in Nigeria. That is about $0.8 at this time, and that's way less than it is in most other countries. The last time I checked, it was really expensive, and that is why I never considered it. Knowing the price is actually way affordable for me, I could become a regular user.