Price increases are a part of life that we're all getting used to. Whether they’re caused by inflationary pressure, increases in costs, or just the desire to make more money, they will happen. One place where we know we’ll see price increases now and then is with the various streaming services that we subscribe to. Netflix just announced a price increase and Disney+ had its first one about a year ago, now Amazon Prime, which hasn’t raised prices in some time, is doing the same over the next month. And the 2022 price hike is going to be more expensive for certain members.
Amazon Prime is, of course, more than just the Amazon Video streaming service, but it comes along with the package so whether you subscribe for the streaming service and take your 2-day shipping as a bonus, or subscribe for the shipping deal and watched Wheel of Time or any Amazon Prime movies because you could, prices are going up. But you can still get in on the current price. If you don’t have an Amazon Prime subscription and want to get a year at the current price click below to do so now.
According to USA Today, beginning February 18, new Amazon Prime subscribers will pay $139 for a year, rather than the current $119. For existing subscribers, the price increase goes into effect after March 25 on the date of their next renewal. So if your renewal date is between now and then, you’ll get another year at the old price, otherwise, when your renewal date comes up, you’ll pay the new price.
However, as mentioned by Bloomberg, a little more than half of Prime subscribers will actually end up paying $180 per year. Why so high you might ask? Well, this is due to the fact that this particular subset of users pay on a monthly basis and that price is increasing from $12.99 to $14.99. Per the site, about 52% of the company's customers pay in this manner, so quite a few people will be impacted.
It’s been a while since we’ve seen a price increase for Amazon Prime, so it’s no real surprise to see it happening. It’s a significant increase, but since Amazon Prime is more than just the streaming service element, that’s not too shocking. Streaming service only subscriptions like Netflix tend to raise prices more often, but only a little bit at a time. Amazon’s plan seems to be to raise prices less often, but more significantly.
Certainly the company's costs have been going up. We didn’t have the roads full of Amazon branded vehicles back when prices went up in 2018, and now we do. We also know Amazon is investing in original streaming content in a big way. The number of original Amazon Prime shows and movies have been going up every year. So there’s a reason for the price increase beyond profit, though certainly one expects the company is still going to make plenty of money.
One has to wonder how monthly-paying customers will respond to the increase in price as, on the surface, $180 does seem a bit steep, though it may not be too bad in the grand scheme of things. Though if anyone happens to be concerned, they can switch to the alternative way of paying.
$139 a year comes out to about $11.58 per month, which is still less than a standard Netflix subscription, so even if you only use Prime to get access to the streaming side of things, it’s potentially a better deal as long as you find enough content there to watch. And if you use Amazon enough to buy stuff, and a lot of people have, especially in the last couple years, the savings in shipping alone are probably still more than this cost. This is likely another reason the company decided to raise prices, it’s unlikely many existing customers will cancel due to the price increase.
