Disney’s move caused dramatic shifts in the streaming services market. How will Apple respond?
It’s amazing how one company can change how you view pricing in an entire market… The media world was taken aback when Disney announced that its new Disney+ service would be initially priced at $7.99, dramatically less than competitors like Netflix and HBO Now. But this week Disney let the other shoe drop, saying that when its service launches on November 12, it will also be available in a bundle with Hulu and ESPN+ for $12.99. Not only will Disney+ undercut Netflix by $5 a month, but a subscription to all three of Disney’s streaming services will cost the same as Netflix.
How will Apple approach this new streaming landscape?
Apple Music costs $9.99 per month. Would it be out of the question for Apple to bundle it with Apple TV+ for that same magic price of $12.99?
MacDailyNews Take: As we wrote the day Disney announced their pricing:
We can’t wait to see how, or if, Apple prices Apple TV+ at launch.
We’d really like to see a way to pay for all of the Apple services we choose for one price. Give us a bunch of tick boxes and let us choose our combination of iCloud storage, Apple Music, iTunes Match, etc. and let us pay a single price for all of our choices. — MacDailyNews, October 17, 2016
As soon as Apple launches their original content video service, an “Apple Prime” will make even more sense. — MacDailyNews, August 29, 2018
Apple could make a more compelling “Prime” bundle than even Amazon can offer because their original content sounds like it will be better and Apple Music + Apple News/Texture are unmatched. If they rolled some iCloud storage deal into it, it’d be tough to resist for many, many people! — MacDailyNews, February 14, 2019
Hopefully, some sort of bundle option will also be available for us all to be able to the combine Apple services we want for a single fee, lower than the cost of subscribing to them à la carte. — MacDailyNews, March 25, 2019
Apple News is just okay. I’m having in there, but just to give it a chance to get better like Apple Music did.
I wonder if the Disney services is with or without commercials.
For $13 you get commercials. Not yet known if you can upgrade to commercial-free, for an extra fee, as you can now with Hulu.
$12.99 for ATV+ & Apple Music is good idea and charge .99 cents for 200Gb of iCloud storage.
Who wants iCloud storage??? Video streaming in our slowass internet city is totally pointless unless you have a big fast local storage and are willing to wait for buffering. Oh that’s right, Apple’s genius product designers have never lived outside their urban bubbles.
Just because it’s starting at that price doesn’t mean it will stay there forever. Unfortunately it’s getting to the point where every service has something good, but not enough that I could ever justify paying for all of them every month. As is I’ve cancelled Netflix and will maybe dip back in for a month and binge a load of stuff then cancel again – which is one of the advantages of stuff being released in one go and being available forever. There’s no need for continuing subscriptions unless you’re rich or if there is regular live content you want to watch.
There’s a HUGE disconnect between the way Apple approaches Hollywood and the way Amazon and clearly Disney do. That single fact, the need to over control and move at a software company’s pace and style will keep Apple TV + an also ran for the foreseeable future. Their usual “premium pricing” approach won’t work here because the market is now too crowded (most people don’t want to just keep adding SVOD to packages) and the way they approach creative production is simply out of step with how it actually gets done. Amazon took the right approach. Let creative people do what they do within financial limits. Netflix took a scorched earth approach which worked but will not sustain them long term. Disney will win because the price and quality are better.. much better. Apple’s only hope.. seriously.. is to buy Disney.
Having just cancelled all my other accumulated monthly subscription barnacles, I’m not gonna pay apple a monthly fee to watch Jennifer Anniston and Reese Witherspoon.