In This Story
YouTube (GOOGL-1.31%) announced on Thursday that it is raising the price for its TV streaming service.
The monthly fee for a base plan of YouTube TV is going up to $82.99 a month, from $72.99, starting today for new members and on Jan. 13 for existing subscribers. The Google subsidiary said it hiked prices to keep up with rising costs related to content and investments in service quality.
“We don’t take these pricing decisions lightly, and we give all members the flexibility to cancel their membership at any time,” a YouTube TV spokesperson told Quartz in an emailed statement.
YouTube TV first debuted in 2017, offering subscribers livestreaming of local TV networks and some cable channels including ESPN (DIS+0.18%), CNN (WBD+14.19%) and TNT for just $35 a month. The last time it raised prices was in March 2023.
The news comes as more people are watching YouTube and other services on their television sets.
More Americans used their TVs to watch content on streaming platforms such as Netflix (NFLX-1.10%) and YouTube in November than they did on either broadcast or cable networks, according to a report from Nielsen. Streaming’s share of TV usage reached an all-time high of 41.6% in November. For comparison, the share of TV usage that same month was 23.7% for broadcast and 25% for cable.
YouTube was the most-watch video streaming service, representing nearly 10.8% of all TV use in November.
In a recent blog post, YouTube said people around the world streamed over 1 billion hours of content daily on their TVs this year. The company added that the amount of time people watched YouTube sports content on their TVs rose 30% in 2024.
