Netflix hikes the price of its Basic and Premium plans

Netflix is increasing the prices of its plans, again. This time, the streaming giant is hiking the cost of its Basic and Premium tiers.

The company has announced its third-quarter earnings result in a letter to its shareholders, which you can find here. The document highlights various details, including the new price hikes.

Netflix Q3 2023 results

Q3 2023 was very successful for Netflix, as it added 8.76 million new subscribers, with a 10.8% Year-over-Year growth. The streaming service now has 247.15 million active subscribers. The company has attributed its growth to its ads plan memberships, which shot up by nearly 70% quarter-over-quarter.

Though the company won't admit it, another significant factor that has contributed to these numbers is the password-sharing crackdown which Netflix enforced in several Countries. Analysts had predicted that the move could have adverse side effects, and that the streamer would lose a significant chunk of its subscribers. On the contrary, it has proven to be remarkably a successful strategy.

Netflix improved its Basic with Ads Plan in April 2023, by increasing the number of simultaneous streams from 1 to 2 devices, and also switched the video quality from 720p HD to 1080p Full HD. This led to a surge in new users signing up for the plan. To boost it further, the streamer discontinued its Basic plan, and renamed the ad supported plan as Netflix Standard with Ads.

Netflix's letter says that 30% of sign-ups for new subscriptions are for the ads plan, which is available in 12 countries: Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Korea, Mexico, Spain, the United Kingdom, and the United States.

Netflix plan prices are increasing

The Netflix Standard with ads plan costs $6.99 per month, and the Netflix Standard plan costs $15.49. These will remain unchanged. However, Netflix has said that it is increasing the Basic Plan's price by $2, i.e. from $9.99 to $11.99 per month. Likewise, the Netflix Premium tier is going up by $3, from $19.99 to $22.99.

It is worth mentioning that Netflix Basic plan is no longer available for new users or rejoining members, only those who have an active subscription may continue renewing it, but they will have to pay more now. Netflix's last price hike. The changes to the pricing also applies to users in the U.K. and France, where the Basic plan costs £7.99 / 10.99€, and the Premium plan now carries a price tag of £17.99 / 19.99€.  The previous prices for the Basic and Premium plans were £6.99 / 8.99€ and £15.99 / 17.99€ respectively.

Netflix Basic to be phased out in other regions

The streaming service says that the removal of the Basic plan has proven to be successful in the U.S., the U.K., Italy and Canada. And since the move also boosted the adoption rate of its ad supported and Standard plans, the company is expanding this to more regions. Netflix Basic will no longer be available in Germany, Spain, Japan, Mexico, Australia and Brazil from next week. One bit of surprising news is that Netflix will start allowing downloads for the ad supported plan from next month. It is also working on introducing the ads plan in device and ISP partner bundles.

Streaming services have become quite expensive over the years, Disney+ also increased its plan prices a few months ago, and started cracking down on password-sharing. Even YouTube has become greedy and has been aggressively blocking ad blockers, in a bid to push users towards its premium subscriptions.

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