According to The Associated Press, the latest is Google’s YouTube TV, which is increasing its monthly fee to $50. It launched at $35 and has raised prices as it added more channels.
The first of this crop of TV services was Dish Networks’ Sling TV in 2015. Its most attractive feature was price, since it offered a handful of popular, live TV channels for $20 a month. A string of other companies announced similar services in the years that followed, many priced from $30-$40 a month. YouTube TV, Hulu Live, AT&T’s DirecTV Now and others were far cheaper than a traditional cable bundle, which costs about $100.
Cable executives derided the online TV packages as unrealistically cheap, but they have grown in popularity as cord-cutting picked up. They have racked up more than 7 million users, according to MoffettNathanson Research, helping offset the declines in traditional TV customers for entertainment companies like Disney, Comcast’s NBCUniversal and Viacom.
But that bump may be petering out. DirecTV Now lost customers for the first time in the fourth quarter after AT&T canned big discounts. MoffettNathanson noted that growth slowed for the online-TV providers overall.
Price increases starting last year — just like you get with your cable package — may be to blame. This year has brought another round of price hikes, often as the bundles fatten up and more closely resemble traditional TV packages.
That could turn still more people off, particularly as subscriber fatigue sets in with a slew of new streaming services coming from Disney, AT&T, Comcast and others.
But the problem for the TV services is that programming costs go up every year, so they’re passing those on.
The first of this crop of TV services was Dish Networks’ Sling TV in 2015. Its most attractive feature was price, since it offered a handful of popular, live TV channels for $20 a month. A string of other companies announced similar services in the years that followed, many priced from $30-$40 a month. YouTube TV, Hulu Live, AT&T’s DirecTV Now and others were far cheaper than a traditional cable bundle, which costs about $100.
Cable executives derided the online TV packages as unrealistically cheap, but they have grown in popularity as cord-cutting picked up. They have racked up more than 7 million users, according to MoffettNathanson Research, helping offset the declines in traditional TV customers for entertainment companies like Disney, Comcast’s NBCUniversal and Viacom.
But that bump may be petering out. DirecTV Now lost customers for the first time in the fourth quarter after AT&T canned big discounts. MoffettNathanson noted that growth slowed for the online-TV providers overall.
Price increases starting last year — just like you get with your cable package — may be to blame. This year has brought another round of price hikes, often as the bundles fatten up and more closely resemble traditional TV packages.
That could turn still more people off, particularly as subscriber fatigue sets in with a slew of new streaming services coming from Disney, AT&T, Comcast and others.
But the problem for the TV services is that programming costs go up every year, so they’re passing those on.
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