Hulu’s two streaming tiers will see a price increase by next month. According to Deadline, the Disney-owned streaming service will add a dollar each to its ad-supported and ad-free versions. The basic plan will shift from $5.99 to $6.99, while the ad-free version will increase to a monthly fee of $12.99. Luckily, it’s reported that this increase will not affect the Disney+ bundle nor Hulu’s Live TV service.
Deadline reports the price hike was expected as the platform and Disney acquired more content in recent months. Hulu itself will add content from the U.S.-standalone version of Hotstar, which will end its service later this year. Hotstar is an international streaming service that provided various Bollywood content and original titles. The platform also had exclusive access to the Indian Premier League cricket coverage as well as other sports. This content will shift to ESPN+.
The price increase also coincides with Disney’s trend of pricing hikes across all of their digital platforms, according to Deadline. While Hulu’s two streaming tiers had not seen a price change since 2019, its Live TV option saw a $10 increase last December, making the service $64.99. Disney+ and ESPN+ both saw a dollar increase in their subscription fees in recent months. And the Disney+ bundle – which includes ESPN+ and the basic Hulu plan wrapped with the multi-franchise streamer – went up a dollar in March of this year.
The increase also means things must be going well for Disney ever since they acquired the service outright from 21st Century Fox and Comcast back in 2019. Deadline reports as of July 3, Disney had acquired 174 million subscribers across its three streaming platforms, which is more than half of the 350 million subscribers benchmark they set to reach by 2024. This year alone, Hulu is estimated to top a total of $3 billion dollars in ad revenue. In comparison, ad revenue for broadcast television closed 2020 at 3.26 billion.
A sign of the times that the future frontier of television is being forged online.