Snapchat Premium (Snapchat+): Price, Features and Is It Worth It?

Snapchat Premium usually means Snapchat+, the official paid subscription from Snap Inc. It adds extras to the normal app, such as seeing who rewatches your Stories, custom app icons, a gold star badge, pinned Best Friend options and early access to new features. In the US it costs around $3.99 a month, with higher plans available: Lens+ at about $8.99 for exclusive Lenses and Platinum at about $15.99, which also removes ads. You subscribe from your profile and pay through the App Store or Google Play. Avoid free “premium” APKs. They’re unofficial, often carry malware and can get your account banned.

Snapchat Premium (Snapchat+): What You Get, What It Costs and Whether It’s Worth Paying For

Google “Snapchat Premium” and you’ll wade through a swamp. A couple of decent write-ups, a ton of “free unlock!!” pages, and a few that exist only to grab your login. Skip all that.

What people mean by the phrase is almost always Snapchat+, a paid plan from Snap Inc. that bolts extra bits onto the app you already use. Two pricier plans sit above it (Platinum and Lens+), and Memories storage is its own purchase. Four items, that’s the entire menu.

What is Snapchat Premium, really?

Snap itself never uses the name. It’s a nickname that caught on because “Snapchat+ or Platinum or Lens+” is a mouthful.

Here’s the lineup. Snapchat+ is the cheap starter. Platinum gives you all of that and kills the ads. Lens+ is for people who practically live in Lenses and AR filters. Then there’s extra Memories storage, which is billed separately and trips up loads of people.

You pay through Apple or Google Play, depending on your phone. No second app, no new account. Flip a plan on from your profile and the extras show up.

[YOUR EXPERIENCE: one or two lines on why you looked into Snapchat Premium, or what made you try it.]

Snapchat+ vs Platinum vs Lens+: prices

Prices vary by country and Snap tweaks them every so often, so treat these as ballpark figures and believe the number in your own app over anything printed here. Recent reporting listed these US prices:

Some regions also have a yearly plan that comes out cheaper per month, if you’re sure you’ll stick around.

Snapchat+ features

Most people end up on Snapchat+, so I’ll spend the most time here. Snap changes this list constantly, and some features take months to reach certain countries. These are the ones people bring up most.

Who’s watching your Stories

For plenty of users, this is the whole reason to subscribe. You can see how many times a Story was rewatched, and who did it. You can also pin one friend as your number one Best Friend, and there’s a ranking of your closest friends people nickname the Friend Solar System. Ever wondered who actually looks at your Stories? Now you’d know. Whether you want to, well, think about that one.

Making the app look like yours

A big chunk of Snapchat+ is cosmetic. Swap the app icon, give certain friends their own notification sound, grab extra Bitmoji options, dress up text-only Stories. A little gold star also sits next to your name so friends can tell you pay.

Nothing here changes how Snapchat works, only how it feels. Some people adore that. To others it’s a bit like paying for stickers.

The AI stuff

Snap keeps stuffing AI into the plan: pinning the My AI chatbot to the top of your chat list, AI-made Lenses, caption suggestions for Stories. It’s the fastest-moving part of the subscription, so buying the plan for one AI trick is a gamble.

Small visibility controls

You can hide when you were last active in chats, nudge your Stories higher in friends’ feeds, and share some Stories with other subscribers only. Handy, but small. If privacy is your actual worry, the free privacy settings do more, and they cost nothing.

Early access

Subscribers often get new features first. Great if you like being early. Not so great if you’d rather someone else hit the bugs.

[YOUR EXPERIENCE: which Snapchat+ feature you actually use most, or the one you stopped using.]

Snapchat Platinum

Platinum is Snapchat+ with the ads ripped out. It costs roughly four times as much, so call it a luxury.

Those ads land between Stories and in Spotlight. Scroll for an hour a day and they’ll drive you up the wall. Open the app twice a week and you’ll hardly register them.

Who should pay? Mostly people who spend real time in Stories and Spotlight and find ads genuinely irritating. Everyone else can stay on the cheaper plan and not lose sleep.

Lens+

Lens+ showed up in mid-2025 and revolves around exclusive Lenses and AR effects, a few powered by AI. Price-wise it sits between Snapchat+ and Platinum.

Use Lenses daily, make videos with them, or just like trying new ones? It fits. Rarely touch them? Don’t bother.

Memories storage costs extra

This one ambushes people. Free Memories storage is now capped at 5GB, and past that you pay. If you’ve been saving every photo and video for years, you may be right up against the limit.

It isn’t included in Snapchat+, either. Separate add-on. Before you pay, try downloading old Memories to your phone or a cloud drive and clearing some room. That alone might fix it for free.

What you already get for free

Pause before spending anything and look at what the free app already does. Snaps, chat, Stories, group chats, Spotlight, Snap Map and most Lenses cost nothing. Same for streaks, Bitmoji, and Memories up to the free limit.

The subscription is a layer on top of an app that works fine without it. Keep that in mind when a video or ad makes some paid feature sound like a must-have. One question cuts through it: would I miss this tomorrow if I never bought it? If no, you’re done.

Snap can also shuffle things between free and paid. A subscriber perk this year might be free next year, or the other way around. Another reason not to rush.

How to subscribe

Here’s the route. Open Snapchat, tap your Bitmoji in the top left, and look near the top of your profile for the Snapchat+ banner, the one with the gold star. Pick a plan (monthly or yearly, if yearly’s offered), then approve the payment with Face ID, your fingerprint or your Google Play password. Done.

If the banner’s nowhere to be seen, update the app first. Still nothing? Either the plan hasn’t reached your country yet, or your account is limited by age or local rules.

How to cancel

Cancelling isn’t done inside Snapchat, which annoys a lot of people. Your app store handles the billing, so that’s where you stop it.

iPhone users: Settings, tap your name, Subscriptions, Snapchat, Cancel. On Android it’s Google Play, your profile picture, Payments and subscriptions, Subscriptions, Snapchat, Cancel.

You usually keep the perks until the paid period runs out. Don’t leave it to the last hour before renewal, though, because stores can be slow to register it. Refunds? That’s up to Apple or Google and where you live, so I wouldn’t count on one.

Is Snapchat Premium worth it?

Depends how you use the thing.

Like customizing, post Stories a lot, enjoy seeing who rewatches them, or want early access? The basic plan is probably fine for a few bucks a month. Lens addicts should look at Lens+.

If you mostly chat, only want the one feature some video showed you, or you’re counting pennies, skip it. Nice to have, not need to have. And if you’re hoping it’ll squash bugs or speed up the app, it won’t.

Easiest test: pay for one month of the cheapest plan. A week in, see what you still use. Nothing? Cancel.

[YOUR EXPERIENCE: whether you kept it after the first month and why.]

A note for parents and teens

Lots of Snapchat users are young, so a quick word for them and for their parents. The bill goes to whoever owns the Apple or Google account on the phone, so that person sees every charge. Both stores have parental controls that can require approval before a purchase goes through, and switching that on is the easiest way to avoid a nasty surprise.

Teens, ask before you subscribe. A few dollars a month adds up over a year, and plenty of the perks are just cosmetic. A couple of the friend-insight features can also make social pressure worse, like obsessing over who rewatched your Story. Not everybody needs more of that.

Tips to avoid wasting money

Start monthly, even when the yearly plan looks like a bargain. You can switch once you know you’ll stick with it. Put a reminder in your phone a few days before the renewal date so the decision is yours, not the app’s. Peek at your app store’s subscription list every so often too, because small plans get forgotten for months.

And buy only inside the app. A “lifetime premium” from some random website? Too good to be true, nearly every time.

Free Snapchat Premium and modded APKs

Search results overflow with promises of free Snapchat Premium, an unlocked Snapchat+, or a “premium APK.” Treat every one as risky.

For starters, these files are unofficial, so nobody can say what’s inside, and malware, data stealers and fake login screens are common here. Next, Snapchat can lock or ban accounts running modified apps, and you could lose Memories and your friends list. And the unlock rarely works anyway, since most of these features run on Snapchat’s servers, not on your phone.

Same story with strangers on social media selling “premium Snapchat” access or accounts. It has nothing to do with the real subscription. Anyone asking you to pay outside the app store? Walk away. The only safe route to Snapchat+ is the one inside the app.

Common problems

A few things go wrong again and again. If the Snapchat+ option never shows up, update the app, restart your phone and make sure the plan exists where you live. If you paid and nothing changed, open your profile and hunt for the Snapchat+ section. Says inactive? Hit Restore Purchases in your app store, or message Snapchat Support with the receipt.

A vanished gold badge usually means a failed renewal, so check your payment method. And if you got charged after cancelling, you most likely cancelled after the renewal date, or cancelled the wrong subscription. The order history in your app store will tell you which.

FAQ

Is Snapchat Premium the same as Snapchat+? Pretty much. Premium is the nickname, Snapchat+ is the actual plan.

How much is Snapchat+? About $3.99 a month in the US right now. Other countries differ, and the app shows you the exact figure before you pay a cent.

Does it remove ads? Nope. Ad-free is Platinum’s job.

Can I get it free? Not in any legit way. Anything claiming otherwise is a trap.

Will my friends see that I subscribed? Usually, yes, because of the gold star by your name. In some places you can hide it in settings.

Is it safe to buy? It is if you buy inside the app. Don’t pay a third party, ever.

Can I use it on more than one phone? Sure. The plan is tied to your Snapchat account, so your perks follow your login, as long as the app store subscription is still active.

Final thoughts

Snapchat Premium won’t transform the app. What you’re buying is a bundle of small extras: a bit of personalization, a peek at who’s watching your Stories, early access, and on the pricier plans no ads and more Lenses. If you’re on Snapchat every day and you enjoy fiddling with things, a few dollars a month is easy to justify. If you aren’t, skipping it costs you nothing.

My advice: start on the basic plan for a month, see what you actually touch, and only move up when one feature has clearly earned it. And steer clear of anyone offering the same thing for free.

Prices and features are based on recent reporting and can change by country and over time. Always check the subscription screen in your own app before you pay.