As the price of subscription streaming services has risen over the past five years, some consumers have turned to the relative safety of bundled economics to take advantage of discounted prices.
But even the bundle isn’t immune from price hikes.
Comcast last week began telling customers that the price of its Xfinity StreamSaver bundle, available to subscribers of Comcast’s Xfinity-branded home-broadband and TV services, will rise from $15 a month to $18 monthly starting December 22.
It’s not entirely unexpected. Since the combo pack featuring Peacock Premium, Netflix Standard with Ads and Apple TV launched in May 2024, each of the three services has seen an individual price increase.
Netflix raised the price of its standard ad-supported tier by $1, to $7.99 a month, back in January; NBCUniversal hiked the monthly price of ad-supported Peacock Premium from $7.99 to $10.99 in July; and Apple TV also went up by $3 a month in August to $12.99.
“We work to keep your costs low by absorbing rising programming fees when possible,” Comcast said in its note to customers. “StreamSaver still saves you over 40% compared to subscribing separately” to the three services.
Comcast is still packaging its 125-network NOW TV pay TV channel service with the bundled SVODs in an $30-a-month offering it calls NOW StreamSaver.
In July 2024, Comcast exec Christine Whitaker shared a StreamSaver update with StreamTV Insider, declaring uptake to be “strong out of the gate.” The cable company hasn’t published any specific details about its performance since that time.
But even with the $3-per month price increase, the StreamSaver bundle could hold appeal.
In September Hub Entertainment Research published its “Decoding the Default” consumer survey results, which revealed two aspects of the NOW StreamSaver’s components — Netflix and live TV packages — to be among the top “default sources” for TV viewing among those polled.
And last week, Parks Associates published its “State of Streaming” report, which revealed service bundling to be the fastest growing enticement for consumers to switch telecom services.
Also interesting: Based on Parks’ survey of more than 8,000 adult U.S. consumers, streaming services have replaced pay TV packages as the top bundled enticement for telecom operators.
“Pay TV is no longer the top service bundled with home internet — streaming video add-ons have taken the top spot. Forty percent of broadband households now bundle a streaming video subscription with their home internet service, making it the clear anchor of the new home services bundle,” Parks said in its report.