SUMMARY
- Twitch, the streaming giant, has brought bad news for its fans in the UK, Canada and Australia.
- The company has announced a price hike in their subscriptions.
Twitch has over the years gained massive popularity and is growing its user base every day. It runs on a subscription-based model, wherein users pay a pre-specified amount to get access to premium content on the platform.
However, amidst all the rising popularity Twitch has announced a major change that could significantly impact its business. It’s no secret that the Amazon-owned streaming platform has been suffering losses and has been struggling to run its business.
Last month the platform announced the termination of as many as 500 of its employees, constituting 35% of its workforce on January 10, 2024. Post that, the CEO Dan Clancy went on record to reveal that they were not making any profits, and their main focus was sustainability.
Twitch raises subscription prices
The company recently announced that they are making Twitch subscriptions more expensive in select countries. The revised rates will be effective in certain locations starting March 28, 2024. They published a blog wherein they announced that they are making changes to prices in Australia, Canada, Turkey, and the UK.
According to Twitch, the updated prices for subscriptions will “help streamer revenue keep pace with rising costs and reflect local currency fluctuations.”
📢 Starting March 28, we’re updating sub and gift prices on web in Australia, Canada, the UK, and Turkey.
🔴 We’ll be live today, Feb 20 at 10am PT on Twitch to discuss the change and You can learn more about the decision and details in our blog post:https://t.co/ejkPzMXVgK
— Twitch Support (@TwitchSupport) February 20, 2024
Notably, this can be considered just the beginning and in the near future price hikes could be expected in other regions too, including the US. Twitch chief monetization officer Mike Minton stated that the Twitch subscription price increase could also apply to the US since the Canadian and US currencies track very closely.
Although Twitch is one of the largest and most successful live-streaming platforms, its recent changes and policy revisions have paved the way for competitors like Kick and YouTube to flourish in the market. Several top streamers have over the years complained about Twitch’s Partner program, community guidelines, and streamer revenue.
This includes some of the most successful and well-known streamers like Adin Ross and Pokimane, who quit the platform entirely and sought better deals on a competing service. Nevertheless, the platform has been making changes to the platform to encourage streamers to stay.
Revised Twitch prices
As earlier announced the platform is all set to close its shutters in South Korea due to high operating costs and network fees. Just a week before it shuts down on February 27, the company announced that Tier 1 subscription and gift sub prices would be increased in certain regions.
It will be hiked by $1 in Australia and Canada and £1 in the UK beginning March 28. Although the revised subscription prices will apply only on desktop and mobile web browsers currently, Twitch plans to revise the Tier 1 pricing to the mobile app as well in the coming months.
#Twitch CMO of Twitch hints at price increase for US subscriptions coming this year pic.twitter.com/ogwewWbRFa
— Livestream Fails (@LSF_Forwarder) February 20, 2024
Here are the revised prices for Twitch Tier 1 subscriptions:
Australia
- Old price: A$7.99
- New price: A$8.99
Canada:
- Old price: C$6.99
- New price: C$7.99
UK
- Old price: £3.99
- New price: £4.99
Similarly, 3 tiers of subscription and gift sub prices on the web will be updated in Turkey. The price increases across all three Twitch tiers will apply in Turkey from March 28 as well. Notably, the prices in Turkey are increasing by roughly 400% across all three tiers, as follows
Tier 1 subs
- Old price: TRY9.90 ($0.32)
- New price: TRY43.90 ($1.42)
Tier 2 subs
- Old price: TRY19.99 ($0.65)
- New Price: TRY87.90 ($2.84)
Tier 3 subs
- Old price: TRY49.99 ($1.62)
- New price: TRY215.90 ($6.98)
Considering its non-profitability, and the departure of top streamers, it seems like the price hikes are their new strategies. This could help it retain its biggest streamers and foster financial stability internally. However, the increased rates have caused frustration among the users.
Besides the fury among the community, the prices of rival platforms remain unchanged and viable. Both cases are not likely to help Twitch’s long-term prospects. Twitch has also mentioned that the price increase will highly likely come to the United States as well.