Hulu & Disney+ Announce Price Hikes
Paul Dailly
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Once upon a time, the streaming market was seen as a cheaper alternative to cable.
However, that has all been changing in the last few years as prices have increased.
We'll start with Disney+, which will launch an ad-supported offering on December 8.
The service will be $7.99 a month, including ads, while the ad-free offering will swell 38% to $10.99 per month.
Disney has been vocal about introducing an ad-supported plan for a while now, but it remains to be seen whether it will be successful.
Hulu, meanwhile, will raise the cost of its ad-free offering from $12.99 to $14.99 from October 10.
The ad-supported offering will go up by $1 to $7.99 per month.
Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN+ have been operating at a loss due to the cost of the content on the services.
However, Disney+ has not stalled in subscriber growth like some of its competitors.
The service has reached 152 million total subscriptions after adding 14.4 million subscriptions in the previous quarter.
The streaming market appears to be ever-changing these days thanks to expanding content costs, which in turn is reflected in the service's prices.
However, there is a big shakeup in the cards down the line as Warner Bros. Discovery recently announced it would be combining Discovery+ and HBO Max into a single service next summer.
There have been rumblings that a similar thing could happen to Disney+ and Hulu, but with the former still adding subscribers and showing no signs of a slowdown, any potential merger will not occur for a few years.
Then there's Netflix, which has largely stalled. The service went years without slowing down, and it did just that this year.
As a result, subscription costs have risen, and the more marginally performing shows have been canceled.
What are your thoughts on the increases?
Hit the comments below.
Paul Dailly was an Associate Editor for TV Fanatic.Follow him on X.
