TOPLINE
Disney+ on Wednesday became the latest streaming service to raise its monthly subscription prices—joining others like Netflix and Amazon Prime—as media companies seek to increase profitability for their platforms.
KEY FACTS
Disney+ will raise its monthly subscription cost to $10.99 starting December, which means users will now have to pay an additional $3 every month to enjoy the same ad-free streams of their favorite Marvel, Disney or Star Wars shows.
Netflix, which continues to report a slump in subscriber numbers, raised prices across all its tiers in March this year with the service’s basic plan now costing $9.99 per month (up by $1), Standard HD plan priced at $15.49 (up by $1.50) and Premium 4K plan priced at $19.99 (up by $2).
Hulu—Disney’s adult-focussed streamer—will also see the price of its ad-supported tier jump by $1 to $7.99 a month, while its premium ad free tier will be hiked by $2 to $14.99 per month.
ESPN+—the sports-focused streaming platform owned by Disney—announced a $3 price hike to $9.99 in June.
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Amazon Prime, the e-commerce giant’s all-in-one subscription service which includes the streamer Prime Video, hiked its annual price by $20 to $139 a year in February.
WHAT TO WATCH FOR
HBO Max is currently priced at $14.99 per month for its ad-free premium tier while its ad-supported tier costs $9.99. Earlier this month, the streaming platform’s new parent Warner Bros. Discovery announced plansto merge the service with Discovery+, which costs $6.99 per month without ads and $4.99 with ads. No pricing strategy has been announced for this merged version of HBO Max but it is very likely it will cost more.
TANGENT
To somewhat soften the blow for consumers, most of the major streaming services have either launched or have announced plans to launch a cheaper ad-supported tier. Disney+ will get an ad-supported tier in December which will cost $7.99—same as the current price of the ad-free plan. After years of reticence, Netflix in July announced plans to launch a cheaper ad-supported plan that will not feature all of its content library. HBO Max jumped on the ad-supported bandwagon last year, launching a $9.99 per month plan. Subscribers who choose HBO Max’s cheaper plan are still able to watch its flagship HBO TV shows without any ads—just like the premium cable channel—and are only served ads while watching other content.
FURTHER READING
By Siladitya Ray, Forbes Staff
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