Google Hits 350M Paid Subs, But YouTube’s Ad Revenue Tells a Different Story

Alphabet’s Q1 earnings are out, and the headline number is 25 million new paid subscriptions across Google’s services in the last quarter. That brings the total to 350 million, up from 325 million at the end of 2025. YouTube and Google One did the heavy lifting.

What’s interesting is what Google didn’t say. There’s no breakdown of how many people are paying for Gemini specifically, or even how many monthly active users the chatbot has. The last number we had was 750 million users, and the earnings report didn’t update it. That silence is telling. Either Gemini isn’t growing fast enough to brag about, or Google is being cagey for competitive reasons.

What they did mention: paid monthly active users for Gemini in the enterprise grew 40% quarter-over-quarter. But again, no hard numbers. So we’re left guessing how big that base actually is.

The more awkward part of the report is YouTube ad revenue. Wall Street wanted $9.99 billion. Google delivered $9.88 billion. That’s a miss, even though it’s still up 11% year-over-year. Sundar Pichai warned last quarter this was coming. When users switch from ad-supported YouTube to YouTube Premium, ad revenue takes a hit. That’s exactly what’s happening.

Last year YouTube did over $60 billion in combined ads and subscriptions. Q4 2025 alone brought in $11.4 billion in ads. This quarter it’s $9.9 billion. The trend is clear: people are paying to skip the ads, and that’s eating into the ad business. Investors might not love it, but it’s a trade-off Google has to live with.

Alphabet’s overall revenue hit $109.9 billion, beating expectations. Cloud revenue crossed $20 billion, which is the real bright spot here. The stock is up, so the market isn’t panicking over the YouTube miss.

I’d keep an eye on how Google handles the tension between ad revenue and subscription growth. They’re basically competing with themselves. If YouTube Premium keeps growing, ad revenue will keep taking a small hit. The question is whether the subscription growth outpaces the ad loss. So far, the numbers suggest it’s a wash, but it’s not a trend that makes Wall Street comfortable.