Hulu announced today that they will be raising the price of their Limited Commercials and No Ads plans by $1 a month. Starting on October 8, Hulu with Limited Commercials will go from $5.99 to $6.99 a month, while Hulu (No Ads) will increase from $11.99 to $12.99. The Hulu Annual Plan, which includes the Limited Commercials plan, will increase from $59.99 to $69.99 a year.
Existing subscribers will see the price increase on their first payment after that date.
There will be no change to the price of Hulu Live TV, which remains $64.99 a month – or $71.99 a month with the Hulu (No Ads) plan.
In comparison, Netflix’s Standard Plan (No Ads) is $13.99 a month, while HBO Max has a $9.99 plan with ads and $14.99 without ads. Paramount+ Essential Plan with ads is $4.99 a month, while their Ad-Free Premium Plan is $9.99 a month. Peacock Premium is $4.99 with ads, and $9.99 a month without.
There will be no change to the price of The Disney Bundle, which will remain $13.99 a month after a price hike – which seems to be one of the catalysts for the price change. Upgrading from a single Disney service to the Bundle makes even more sense now.
With the recent price increases to ESPN+ ($6.99) and Disney+ ($7.99), the Disney Bundle will be 37% cheaper than if you purchase all three Disney-owned services. In fact, if you plan to subscribe to Disney+ and either ESPN+ or Hulu – it is now cheaper to just get the Disney Bundle than getting just two services.
This is the first price change to Hulu, since they lowered the price from $7.99 to $5.99 in February 2019. Disney recently raised the price of Disney+ to $7.99 (was $6.99) in March 2021, while increasing the price of ESPN+ in August.
While Hulu has lost some licensed content in the last year, namely from Discovery with the launch of Discovery+ – they made up for it by expanding their offering of originals. Their recently launched Nine Perfect Strangers, Only Murders in the Building and Vacation Friends – joining The Handmaid’s Tale, as some of the most watch content on the service. They also just merged the content from Hotstar to bring Bollywood hits to the platform.
This Fall, they will also be the home to 75-exclusive NHL games, which will also stream on ESPN+.
In August, Hulu reported 42.8 million subscribers, including 3.7 million with Hulu Live TV. That was up 21% since last year, when they had 35.5 million subscribers.