Disney announced Tuesday it’s raising prices for its various streaming services. Disney+, Hulu, ESPN and bundles thereof, with or without ads, will all see subscription costs increase by $2 to $3 per month, starting October 21.

It’s the fourth straight year Disney has hiked prices. And there’s been a steady drumbeat of increases from other streamers too as platforms move away from chasing subscriber growth to chasing profits.

Jonathan Barnes is as loyal a New Orleans sports fan as you can find. But after this round of price increases, he’s decided to turn his back on ESPN’s streaming service.

“It's not like my wife and I are struggling,” he said. “But on the principle alone … you just get to the point as a consumer where you get tired of it.”

When we first spoke almost two years ago, Barnes subscribed to seven different streaming services to get access to all his favorite sports. But he’s whittled that down to four apps as prices have increased.

“If it’s something that I really want to watch,” he said, “I will find a friend or family member … who has the service that I need to watch it and watch it over there.”

Since 2024, consumers have reduced the average number of streaming services they pay for at once, said Jon Giegengack, founder of Hub Entertainment Research.

“The increase in any single streaming platform, you know, while that might not be super dramatic, if you are stacking four or five of these, like many, many, many people are, the aggregate impact to how much you're spending each month can be pretty significant,” he said.

But it’s actually not the most premium services that users have tended to quit, said Jennifer Kent, VP of research at Parks Associates. The churn rate for Disney apps, Netflix, Amazon Prime, and HBO Max has been pretty stable.

“Because almost all of these streaming providers have an ad-based option, that's allowed the services to continue to increase prices but have a more affordable option,” Kent said.

She said it’s the smaller streamers that are the fourth, fifth, or sixth subscription that consumers are more likely to cycle through. You know the ones with the mysterious names that sound kind of like gibberish: Xumo, Dekkoo, Kocowa. 

“I sign up for services when there's a promotion, and then I schedule an email to myself the week before the promotion ends to cancel it,” said analyst Ross Benes at E-Marketer.

He said we’re likely to see more consolidation and bundling in the streaming industry as price pressures continue to make consumers pickier.

“No one has any new ideas. We're just redoing the same ideas that were used in the previous technology,” Benes said.

Meet the new TV: same as the old TV.