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That was fast! Just one week after Paramount closed its purchase of Warner Bros. Discovery, forming Skydance Corp., Discovery+ has announced an unsurprisingly timed price hike.
Effective immediately—meaning now—Discovery+ is officially one dollar more (at $6.99 per month) for its ad-supported plan, while its commercial-free option increased by two bucks to $11.99 a month for new subscribers.
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Existing subscribers have been given 30 days' advance notice about the price increases, which means you’ve got a month to decide whether or not you want to keep Discovery+ among your increasingly expensive collection of streaming options.
The streamer, which boasts about 24 million global subscribers and five million in the U.S., has a broad library that includes content from the Discovery Channel, TLC, HGTV, Animal Planet, the Food Network, ID and Magnolia Network. The company last reported 24 million global subscribers in March 2022, prior to its last merger, that between Warner Bros. and Discovery, Inc.
According to Deadline, the newly formed Skydance has about $80 billion in debt and needs to pay it off with back-end efficiencies, real estate sales, layoffs and, yes, increased pricing for streaking customers.
The company's new owner, David Ellison, recently unveiled his plan to combine HBO Max and Paramount+ into one streaming service, but a timeline hasn’t been publicized just yet. It’s likely, however, the two streamers will offer a bundling option à la Disney+ and Hulu.
For now, we’re saddled with yet another price streaming hike—Disney+, Peacock and Apple TV have all increased their rates this year, too. Farewell money!