© Unsplash/Glenn Carstens-Peters
Netflix, Amazon, Apple and even Disney+: all the major streaming platforms have announced a significant increase in their prices around the world. Difficult to swallow in a period of inflation when films and series remained the only affordable leisure activities for millions of French people.
After Netflix and increases that could exceed 60%, Apple increased its prices last week by 43%! A few months earlier, Amazon announced a 16% increase in its Prime offer (including access to Prime Video) and Disney+ will increase to 11.99 euros per month instead of 8.99 euros from November 1 (+33%) .
These new price increases are enough to annoy users who have already suffered a series of increases in recent years. According to a BearingPoint study, the monthly budget allocated to streaming platforms by French households increased from 37 euros in 2022 to 42 euros in 2023. And the increases at the end of the year are not yet taken into account.
Increased competition
To explain these increases, the giants of the sector are floundering. Some, like Netflix, highlight the density and quality of the catalog. An argument that does not pass, the catalog being precisely the element most often criticized by users. The American company at least has the elegance to put forward a semblance of an explanation. The other platforms don't even bother with justifications.
In reality, users pay for both stronger competition (with more and more players) and a saturated market. In France, 65% of households subscribe to at least one video streaming platform according to BearingPoint. Even more telling, 55% of Netflix subscribers also subscribe to Prime Video, 36% to Disney+.
But faced with rising prices, the risk of subscribers fleeing is becoming greater and greater. . In Spain, the end of account sharing at Netflix led to 1 million departures. A phenomenon compensated by the opening of accounts with advertising ensures Netflix. Its latest results prove that this strategy works. But until when?
How to pay less?
To reduce the amount of the bill, there are several tips. The simplest (and least interesting for the platforms) is to only subscribe to one service at a time, when the content offered is interesting.
Offers offered by access providers Internet also allows you to accumulate subscriptions at a lower cost. In this little game, Free is the most interesting with its Freebox Delta offer including Netflix Standard and Amazon Prime Video at no extra cost.
Finally, Canal+ offers an unbeatable offer for big consumers of films and series. For around thirty euros the first year (45 euros the second), subscribers have access to the Netflix (Standard), Disney+, Paramount+, Apple TV+ and OCS catalog in addition to the 7 Canal+ channels and access to its catalog of films and series. The Rat+ offer, offered occasionally, even allows students to get by for less than 30 euros per month.
The fact remains that these offers will end one day or another. Access providers and Canal+ will not be able to absorb the additional cost forever. For the moment, the agreements between these entities and the platforms are still binding, but when these end, new prices will certainly be applied to compensate for the increase in prices imposed by the platforms.
From then on, users will only have two solutions to pay less: opt for offers with advertising (at Netflix and Disney+) or unsubscribe. Unless consumers make a return to illegal services. Because the platforms may bury their heads in the sand, piracy remains the biggest threat weighing on the industry.
The 3 things to remember
- All streaming platforms have increased their prices
- There are solutions to pay less
- These increases are relaunching the piracy in Europe
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