Handling movies with ads

The operation of VideoSkip is based on timing within the movie you are playing, so the question is, "if the movie contains ads, will this cause VideoSkip to skip at the wrong times, thus causing undesirable material to be seen?"

We have found in our testing that this indeed is a problem with some streaming services, while others are unaffected.

These can have ads, but they don't affect the operation of VideoSkip:
  • YouTube
  • Crackle
  • Plex
  • Vudu
  • Sling
  • Tubitv
These are BAD with ads:
  • Amazon
  • IMDB
  • Pluto
Of these, Amazon is a little special. It likes to place an ad or two before free to watch movies that don't have any more ads after that. These beginning ads also throw the timing off, but there is a way to get things running correctly. Just reload the movie page once or twice until it starts directly without ads, and then all the VideoSkip timings will be correct. IMDB free movies always contain ads that interfere with VideoSkip. The same happens with Pluto.

VideoSkip will warn you if your service customarily uses ads that interfere with its operation. This does not mean necessarily that filtering won't work, only that you should make sure that there are no ads within the particular video you are watching.