Yup, you’re getting screwed.
The cost to simply watch new TV shows is up — way up — with streaming services delivering one wearisome price shock after another that rival the worst of the cable and satellite price hikes of yesteryear. Since 2022, streaming prices have risen more than three times as much as inflation (which is also too high).
Behold some not-so-fun facts:
· The price of Apple TV has tripled. The streamer launched at just $4.99 in 2019. It’s jumped 200 percent despite having the thinnest library — in terms of quantity, at least — of the major streamers.
· Disney+ is right behind Apple TV. The service launched at $6.99 with no ads in 2019 and has since jumped to $11.99 with ads — or pay a whopping 172 percent more than its launch price.
· Paramount+’s cheapest tier is up 80 percent in five years. Netflix Premium is up 125 percent since 2013.
· If you want all eight major streamers without ads or bundle commitments, it’ll cost you about $151 a month. Four years ago, the comparable lineup cost about $90.
So you thought you cut the cord, but now you probably have four, five or six cords — and each is auto-drafting from your bank account so you can keep watching Love Island and Tulsa King.
The outlier here is HBO Max, having only climbed 23 percent over six years. HBO has been priced as a premium product for decades, however, and launched its streaming service in 2020 at a higher price point than the other services.
And these numbers hide some recent drama. Apple TV went up 50 percent just in the past year. Peacock’s tiers likewise leapt about 50 percent. (It’s a bit wild that HBO Premium is only $3 more than Peacock Premium Plus, especially when the former gives you dragons and Hogwarts and the latter offers The Miniature Wife and Married at First Sight.)
Over the course of the past 12 months, streaming rates have collectively risen 11.8 percent. The biggest year of increase was 2023, when the streamers shot up an average of 17.7 percent. A Hollywood Reporter analysis of Bureau of Labor Statistics data shows cable and satellite prices, by comparison, rose an annual average of 3.9 percent — excluding a deregulation surge of the late 1980s, when the index peaked at 14 percent. But that was a seismic shift provoked by a federal intervention rather than, say, because Widow’s Bay is a good show, or “we’re pretty sure we can get away with this.”
It’s worth pointing out that streaming hikes have wildly outpaced inflation — even with inflation wildly outpacing what should be inflation. Consumer prices have climbed an average of 3.84 percent annually since 2019, double the Federal Reserve’s 2 percent target. That number might still seem small, but it’s added up to a 33 percent increase in the cost of consumer living, which is why everything besides a Costco hot dog has gotten noticeably more expensive. This is also why streaming price hikes are such a gut punch — annual bumps of 10 or 15 percent compound fast.
At this point, you might be wondering: Does this mean cable TV is now a better deal by comparison?
Not at all, not unless you’re a massive sports fan or are really into the Hallmark Channel (hey, My Christmas Cowboy debuts in December). Fully loaded bundles from the likes of Spectrum and DirecTV cost north of $170.
So what’s the solution? Just quietly suffer? Yes — in one way or another. You could do what your uncle commenting on this story on Facebook will suggest (perhaps in all caps): Buy an over-the-air antenna for $25 and tune into whatever the broadcast gods are willing to give you. But that way lies entertainment despair. Our TV past wasn’t actually better — you were just younger, so everything seemed better.
The best hack comes courtesy of Gen Z, who have reportedly embraced streaming cycling. You subscribe to just one streamer for a month or two, catch up on whatever you want, unsubscribe, then subscribe to another. It’s literally “this one simple trick that streamers hate.” Granted, you’ll fall behind on many shows, and won’t be able to participate in watercooler conversations — but since when have you ever seen anybody standing around a watercooler besides in those HR employee compliance videos?