Not too long after Spotify announced another price hike in a year, Netflix is making a similar move with its services. The streaming platform is phasing out the cheapest ad-free plan of $11.99 and forcing subscribers to either choose the $6.99 ad-supported tier or the next ad-free tier priced at $15.49. Those who are not happy with the update can, of course, cancel their subscription altogether.
According to various posts on Reddit, Netflix is starting the phase-out with the UK and Canada, with more markets to follow. Around the same time last year, the streaming service dropped its cheapest ad-free tier, which started at $9.99. Despite price hikes in Q3 2023, Netflix added more than 8 million subscribers.
We can't say that we haven't been warned about this. In a quarterly investor letter, the company stated: “As we invest in and improve Netflix, we’ll occasionally ask our members to pay a little extra to reflect those improvements, which in turn helps drive the positive flywheel of additional investment to further improve and grow our service.” Only the numbers will show if the customers are willing to comply with the future improvements.
