ESPN+ To Raise Subscription Prices This August

The prices of the popular ESPN+ streaming service are set to rise by a dollar in August, to $7.00 a month, up from $6.00, according to Deadline.

What’s Happening

Popular Disney owned streaming service, ESPN+, is reportedly raising the cost of a subscription to the sports-centric streamer to $7.00 a month in August, up a dollar from the previous $6.00 price tag.
A full year of the service will now cost $70.00, up $10.00 from the previous $60.00.
The change, which mirrors a price hike by a similar amount that came to the ultra-popular Disney+ earlier this year, is set to take effect on August 13th.
As of press time, it was reported that the price for the popular bundle which combines ESPN+, Disney+, and Hulu will remain unchanged, staying at $14.00 a month for the ad-supported bundle. The rate for pay-per-view UFC fights will also reportedly remain unchanged.
Originally launched in 2018, ESPN+ cost $5.00 a month, offering few live offerings for subscribers but added more to its lineup over the next few years. Disney is also reportedly bidding for rights to NFL Sunday Ticket games, and have recently signed a deal for NHL rights that will stream exclusively on ESPN+.
PGA Tour events, SEC College Football, Wimbledon, Major League Baseball, the NFL, are all on or coming to the platform, as well as a slew of original programming exclusive to ESPN+.
Walt Disney Company CEO Bob Chapek has been asked numerous times about the future of ESPN as Disney shifts to a more direct-to-consumer focus, with Chapek responding to the question during a recent conference call with Wall Street Analysts, “When the right time comes for us to make a step function increase, as we’ve done with our entertainment platforms to our sports platforms, and it’s accretive to our shareholder proposition, we’ll go ahead and do that. Our longer-term vision is to parallel path both ESPN and ESPN+.”
During a recent earnings report, Disney said that ESPN+ had over 13 million subscribers, but has not shared how many of those subscriptions come out of the Hulu/Disney+/ESPN+ bundle.
This isn’t the first time that ESPN+ has raised its price. Last August, we saw the price increase from the original $5.00 a month to $6.00 a month, which is now rising to $7.00 a month on August 13th.