- Ad-free TikTok subscription is coming to the UK
- It’ll cost you £3.99 per month
- It’s rolling out now and should be available to all UK users in the coming months
TikTok is getting a paid subscription tier in the UK as it seems no streaming service is immune to price hikes — though a free with ads option will remain.
It’s starting to roll out now to users who are 18 and over, and for £3.99 a month, you’ll be able to completely ditch ads while scrolling. Well, you won’t see ads serviced by TikTok, but sponsored creator content (the videos often tagged with #ad) will still appear in your feed.
If you haven’t seen an in-app notice about it yet, TikTok has said it will gradually expand the service to people over the next few months.
Alternatively, you can choose not to sign up and keep watching TikTok for free, but you’ll continue to see personalized ads in your feed every so often.
The company has been testing ad-free subscriptions since 2023, and it isn’t the first social media site to offer something along this line. There are services such as YouTube Premium, or Facebook and Instagram’s ad-free tiers (which launched in 2025).
Non-social media sites have joined this “consent or pay” structure too, with the plan being that it allows websites to comply with UK data protection law while still making money from users who want privacy.
Essentially, users have to be allowed privacy controls over targeted ads — advertisements which use tracked data across your accounts and online habits to send you more personalized suggestions. The thing is, these targeted ads are more valuable because they’re more likely to convert viewers into buyers.
Under this consent-or-pay system, you can opt out of targeted ads by opting out of ads entirely and paying a fee.
The trouble with this system in privacy advocates’ minds is that it creates a two-tiered internet. Speaking to the BBC, social media expert Matt Navarra explained that “We are heading towards a two-tiered social internet. One version for people who can afford more control and privacy, and another version for everybody else.”
A litany of new subscription fees feels especially difficult to pay right now as we see the cost of everything — including more essential purchases — rise due to a mixture of global and national financial challenges.
The counterargument is that these services are offered for no charge despite not being free to provide and maintain. In exchange for not paying a fee, you’ll see some ads; it’s a fair deal.
The thing is, the personal data fuelling targeted ads is incredibly valuable — a lot more than we might realize. So it is a trade, but the fairness of the deal is up for debate.
Unfortunately, TikTok’s new subscription model is likely a sign of more to come in the UK, where, increasingly, the only free data privacy method is simply to stop using these sites and services altogether. Though these sites are banking on the hope that it won’t happen.
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hamish.hector@futurenet.com (Hamish Hector)
