Price hikes for streaming TV have become a new holiday tradition as Netflix, Disney + and Hulu have increased their subscription prices for 2021. Therefore, the end of the year is a great time to confirm how much you’re paying for subscriptions, and cancel the ones you barely use.
Recent price hikes for TV streaming
Netflix increased the price of its popular standard plan (1080p and two simultaneous streams) from $ 12.99 per month to $ 13.99 per month. Netflix’s premium plan (4K video and four simultaneous streams) has increased from $ 15.99 to $ 17.99 per month. These changes are effective for both new and old subscribers. The Basic plan, which offers SD streaming and a single stream only, remained unchanged at $ 8.99 per month.
Disney + announced in December that it is increasing its monthly subscription price by one dollar to $ 7.99 per month, and the annual subscription goes up by ten dollars to $ 79.99. The price change will take effect on March 26, 2020, so you can set an even lower price now.
Hulu has another year-on-year increase, this time increasing its live TV product, from $ 54.99 to $ 64.99 per month. The option to watch ad-free increases from $ 60.99 to $ 70.99 per month. Hulu’s VOD-only plans remain unchanged at $ 5.99 per month with ads and $ 11.99 per month without ads. These changes took effect on December 18, for both existing and new subscribers.
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Also, earlier this year, YouTube TV announced whopping 30% monthly increase from $ 50 to $ 65, which took effect on July 31.
This is in addition to other services you may also have, such as:
Time for a streaming TV audit?
All told, these increases will likely only affect a few dollars on your total streaming bill, even if you have more than one service (the average person three paid TV subscriptions). This fact also doesn’t really justify buying a traditional cable box, which is still very expensive compared to TV streaming (the average cable bill is $ 217.42, according to a Decision Data survey).
But these rate hikes can add up over time as well, as these services all use “evergreen” automatic payment and annual renewals through your credit card. If you want to cancel, you have to do your very best to opt out of renewal, and many people don’t. The danger is, it’s easy to overlook these increases over time – just look at Hulu’s live TV plan, which is up $ 25 per month during the past years. That’s a lot of money if you don’t pay attention to the costs.
If you’re not sure how much you’re spending on TV streaming, you’ll want to do a subscription check: scan your credit card bills for subscription services, add up the costs, and decide what to cancel or keep – for more information on subscription audits, read this Lifehacker post.
As these services seem to be on the rise late in the year, you may want to set a corresponding annual subscription auditing reminder in your calendar – this can be an easy way to save money.