DirecTV Now Raising Prices for All Plans by $10/Month Starting in April

[MacRumors]

Eight months after DirecTV Now raised the prices of all streaming plans by $5/month to stay in line with the market, the company is this week warning customers that it's increasing the prices again, this time by $10/month across the board. The company will reportedly begin implementing this price hike in the next billing cycle for customers, starting in April (via Cord Cutters News).

This means that DirecTV Now's basic "Live a Little" tier will rise from $40/month to $50, "Just Right" will increase from $55/month to $65, "Go Big" will increase from $65/month to $75, and "Gotta Have It" will increase from $75/month to $85. The Spanish language Todo y Más package will also increase from $45/month to $55. There will be no changes to channel availability in these plans.

In addition to all of this, DirecTV Now is introducing two new plans that will be available to new customers signing up for the service, instead of the five previously mentioned plans. These new plans are "DirecTV Now Plus" ($50/month for 40+ channels) and "DirecTV Now Max" ($70/month for 50+ channels). While the new plans include HBO at no additional charge, they are missing a number of channels from the previous plans including ones from Viacom, Discovery, A&E, and AMC.

New customers will only see these two new plans, but it appears that anyone signed up for DirecTV Now on one of the five original plans will be able to keep their subscriptions intact, albeit at a $10 higher monthly price tag.

Image via Reddit user plgdg​

As a point of comparison, the new DirecTV Now Plus plan priced at $50/month compares directly to the Live a Little plan at its new $50/month cost, but the number of channels available is different. New customers signing up for DirecTV Now Plus will get 40+ channels, while existing customers get 65+ channels for the same $50/month price. This information can be seen on a screenshot of DirecTV Now's price comparison charts (via Reddit).

It was reported in January that DirecTV Now lost as many as 267,000 subscribers in the fourth quarter of 2018, attributed to the closure of several discount bundles that were heavily featured on the service's website, including the popular Apple TV bundle. This month, DirecTV Now gained support for Apple's TV app, allowing users to sync their TV shows watched in DirecTV Now with the Up Next list in the TV app.

Article Link: DirecTV Now Raising Prices for All Plans by $10/Month Starting in April

 

[Optheduim]

Boooooo. Nothing like cutting the cord only to pay the same prices...

 

[macduke]

And NOW we're suddenly paying as much as we were for cable/satellite previously.

I switched to their other service, "Watch TV", which is only $15/mo without sports and it has been fine.

 

[az431]

Barely worth it at the old price.

 

[max2]

Stupid.

They are going to out price people paying for this.

 

[j569mxr]

Just the push I needed to drop their mediocre service and commit to youtube tv.

 

[2010mini]

Well that didn’t take long.

 

[itsmilo]

TV and Internet is so crazy expensive in the US. I could never afford it lol

 

[Wags]

Just more arrogance and must be hurting for next quarter results.

 

[turbineseaplane]

And the customers began to sing...

 

[jeff275]

It's not really cutting the cord when you drop cable TV and subscribe to all sorts of other services. Heck, it's still coming in on the same cable in most households, it's just modulated differently.

 

[dfnj123]

It's a shame. DirecTV literally knows there's no other service with alternative to their channel selection, so they're willing to price gorge consumers. I'm currently grandfathered into $25 off "Go Big" plan with HBO. When I originally signed up I was paying $35 a month, and now I'm going to be paying $55.

I would switch to the new Plus plan, but I don't want to lose access to Viacom channels, AMC, etc.

I would switch to a different streaming service, but I know that I would have to subscribe to multiple services to get the same channel selection I have at the moment. It would collectively cost more in the long run.

At this point I would actually save money by switching back to cable, but the last thing I want to do is deal with Spectrum and their awful cable boxes/rental fees. The original appeal of these streaming TV services was cost saving compared to cable, but that advantage has disappeared at this point.

Can't wait until someone comes up with a competitively priced all la carte live TV streaming plan with local channels. I'd be the first to sign up and ditch DTVN.

 

[69Mustang]

I hope this doesn't surprise anyone. This was always going to transpire. Their streaming price was never going to remain attractive. Basically what they're going to have on offer is either slightly less expensive content-deficient streaming or expensive streaming packages that are the equivalent of the old cable packages.

 

[ghostface147]

Eventually, for some, cord cutting will be more expensive than cable TV and internet.

 

[Optheduim]

TV and Internet is so crazy expensive in the US. I could never afford it lol

Not sure where you are, but as someone who frequents London, I’ve heard otherwise. We (meaning New York State—> each state may vary) at least don’t have a TV tax.

 

[joeblough]

argh, i'm also a $35 customer and now paying $40 (but it seems they have thrown in HBO for free again??). i don't think i will tolerate $50.

i hardly use the thing - i just want it to watch the occasional NBA game and the NBA playoffs. maybe there is something cheaper out there for just that...

 

[turbineseaplane]

It's not really cutting the cord when you drop cable TV and subscribe to all sorts of other services. Heck, it's still coming in on the same cable in most households, it's just modulated differently.

..and, crucially, the content provider has quietly made the customer in charge of procuring and paying for the delivery of the content

 

[aaronhead14]

No surprise here. This is why they'll never get my money. Never was a customer, and never will be.

 

[MattEcho]

Yeah, this whole system stinks. Where I live, my only real option for internet is Spectrum and they price it so it’s cheaper for me to bundle with cable. But I don’t use the cable service, since they forced us to use a separate cable box. Now DirectTV is raising this price on me...so I guess I’ll cancel and go back to using the old antenna. But I’ll still be paying $75 for slow internet.

 

[dfnj123]

argh, i'm also a $35 customer and now paying $40 (but it seems they have thrown in HBO for free again??). i don't think i will tolerate $50.

i hardly use the thing - i just want it to watch the occasional NBA game and the NBA playoffs. maybe there is something cheaper out there for just that...

Unless you switch to the new Plus or Max plans (which would cause you to lose Viacom, Discovery, A&E, AMC, etc.) you still have to pay $5 for HBO.

It'll be $55 a month, *shakes my head*

 

[redneckitengineer]

I've been drinking their kool-aid since the beginning. I can't find it listed anywhere but if this hits the original grandfathered accounts I'm out. This is the end of my 2+ yrs with them.

 

[codyliger]

It would be different if they were improving the service or actually working on the major bugs in there service, but they aren’t. It’s straight up garbage. Always. Not worth the money. I really wish Apple would bring out the same type service. I know they aren’t. But wish they would.

 

[stoopkidblues]

So in another "8 months" they'll increase the pricing $15?

It's not so much the actual increase than it is the random timeframe. Really doesn't even try to justify why exactly there needs to be an increase, etc. just "whoops, guess that $5 increase wasn't good enough a few months ago so lets try $10 now". I really wanted to like this service and since I have ATT unlimited data I get a discount off NOW, but another increase and I don't see the point when YouTube/Hulu live are just as accessible for relatively cheaper.

But ATT is going to ATT smh

 

[zaphon]

It was so much simpler many years ago when I first cut the cord from Cable. I went from $130+ a month down to just Internet and Netflix/Amazon prime ($40 for net and $15 for Netflix/Amazon). Now a days you pay more for internet, you are at risk of going over your data caps when you stream (It doesn't take long to reach 1TB if you exclusively stream, especially if you have multiple TV's in your household), and the entire reason people cord cut was to get out of these bundles where you have to buy 40 channels the get the 1 or 2 you wanted. Now you have Hulu, DirecTV, Youtube, Sony, etc. all in and we're right back to the same practice. You want these 4 channels, you have to subscribe to our 70 channel bundle to get those. Where am I saving money at?

Oh and what is this "We're raising our prices to be inline with other services?" Wait so it's against the rules to offer a better price than your competitors? How is that competition? "Everyone else charges more, so we will as well!" WTF?

 

[iGeek2014]

Not sure where you are, but as someone who frequents London, I’ve heard otherwise. We (meaning New York State—> each state may vary) at least don’t have a TV tax.

Yes. In the UK you have the Licence Fee, and then if you subscribe to Sky et al. you’ve got their monthly fees on top, too.