Look out for price increases in 2021

Illustration for the article titled Beware of Rising Price Rises in 2021

Photo: Said Marroun (Shutterstock)

Price increases for streaming TV have become a new holiday tradition as Netflix, Disney + and Hulu increase their subscriber prices before 2021. Therefore, year-end is a good time to confirm how much you pay for subscriptions, and cancel those you barely use.

Recent price increases on 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), increased from $ 15.99 to $ 17.99 per month. These changes apply to both new and old subscribers. The basic plan, which offers SD streaming and just a single stream, remains unchanged at $ 8.99 per month.

Disney + announced in December that it would increase its monthly subscription price by one dollar $ 7.99 per month, and its annual subscription increases by ten dollars, to $ 79.99. The price change takes effect on March 26, 2020, so you can still close a lower price.

Hulu has another annual hike, this time raising its live TV product, from $ 54.99 to $ 64.99 per month. The option to watch without ads increases from $ 60.99 to $ 70.99 per month. Hulu’s only VOD plans will 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.

Also earlier this year YouTube TV announced a huge monthly increase of 30%, from $ 50 to $ 65, which came into effect on 31 July.

This is in addition to other services that you may also have, such as:

Time for a streaming TV audit?

These increases will probably only affect a few dollars through your increase, even if you have more than one service (the average person has three paid TV subscriptions). This is also not really the case for acquiring 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 increases can also increase over time, as these services all use ‘evergreen’ automatic payment and annual renewals via your credit card. If you want to cancel, you have to make an effort not to accept renewal, and many people do not. The danger is that it’s easy to overlook these increases over time – just look at Hulu’s live TV plan, which has risen by $ 25 per month in the last few years. It’s a lot of money if you do not pay attention to the cost.

If you are not sure how much you are spending on TV streaming, you will want to do a subscription audit: scan your credit card accounts for subscription services, calculate the cost and decide what you want to cancel or keep – for more information on subscription audits, read this Lifehacker message.

As these services seem to increase late in the year, you may want to set up a corresponding annual subscription audit reminder in your calendar – this can be an easy way to save money.

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