The price of your Real Housewives and Poker Face addiction is going up. Peacock is joining the streaming industry’s price hike party, raising the cost of its basic plan by $1 per month and its ad-free tier by $2. Starting Aug. 17, existing customers without annual plans or other discounts will see their monthly rate rise to either $5.99 for basic Peacock (which goes by the Orwellian moniker Peacock Premium) or $11.99 for Peacock Premium Plus (no pesky commercials, save for live events and a handful of titles). For new customers, the price hike is effective pretty much immediately.
The increase represents the first change in pricing for the NBCUniversal-owned service since it launched nationally three years ago this month (unless you count its decision in January to get rid of its totally free tier for new customers, or its move to cut off Xfinity and Cox cable customers from free access to the $5 tier).
Peacock — which has added exclusive next-day access to NBC and Bravo shows in recent months, as well as live feeds of Hallmark’s three cable channels — is also the last major streamer to make a change to its launch pricing, and the move puts its monthly fee on, er, par with Paramount+ (also $5.99/$11.99), but keeps the streamer at least a buck cheaper than Apple TV+, Prime Video, and the ad-supported versions of Disney+,  Hulu, Max and Netflix. Given that all the streamers have raised their rates within the past 18 months, you might be thinking, “Well, at least we’re safe from more increases for a while.†Think again: Some Netflix watchers think the streamer could be prepping another bump soon. Good thing there’s not a strike or anything going on that might threaten the supply of new content to platforms over the next six to twelve months!