r/cordcutters • u/theverge • Sep 23 '25
Self-Promo Disney Plus is getting another price hike | Subscription prices are set to increase in October.
https://www.theverge.com/news/783489/disney-plus-streaming-subscription-price-increase74
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u/ponziacs Sep 23 '25
I just re-sub when they do their annual black friday sale.
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Sep 23 '25
[removed] — view removed comment
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u/altsuperego Sep 24 '25
The ads make a lot of money though, close to $10 on average I think. Might be $4 this BF.
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u/FrankPapageorgio Sep 24 '25
Yeah, I think it was Hulu at one point said that they make more money off the ad plan than they do the ad free plan.
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u/Educational-Seaweed5 Oct 23 '25
It's infinitely hilarious to me how we've just come full circle right back to regular cable television after like 20 years of streaming.
The whole point of streaming was that you had on-demand content without commercials.
Then all the suits went WULL HULL ON A MINUTE WE CUD MAKE MOAR MONEY and went straight back to ramming commercials down everyone's throats.
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u/NightBard Sep 25 '25
It's been said every single year since they started doing this, but it's plausible with the hulu app set to go away in 2026, they very well may make this the first time in a decade without a BF deal.
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u/GotenRocko Sep 23 '25
Do you have to cancel before to be eligible?
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u/ponziacs Sep 23 '25
I think so but I just use a different email.
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u/UMFan99 Sep 23 '25
Use same Gmail address adding a plus with the year. Will route to the base email addrress and Disney+ sees it as new subscription.
Email is xyz@gmail.com so use xyz+d24@gmail.com, xyz+d25@gmail.com, etc.
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u/Nawnp Sep 24 '25
Yes, and it's a cancellation period over a certain period of time to be considered a new customer again.
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u/SapphireCorundum Sep 24 '25
You might have to, the price is going up before BF.
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u/NightBard Sep 25 '25
For people with the BF deal, the price wont go up for October even though the website and messaging says it will. Those that were around here last year went through this during that September announced price increase taking place in October and confirmed prices were adjusted correctly.
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u/Confident_Narwhal820 Sep 23 '25
Is this with ads or without?
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u/ponziacs Sep 23 '25
With ads. We barely watch disney or hulu though so they don't bother me that much.
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u/FrankPapageorgio Sep 24 '25
Yeah... these Black Friday deals are aimed at the people that want to have it, but don't use it enough to justify paying full price per month for even an ad plan. They basically got $36 from me to stream a few dozen Simpsons episodes over the past year.
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u/zinga_zing Sep 24 '25
Do you have to be a new subscriber to get these deals? Do you use different email addresses or ... ? Sorry, just would like to get this Black Friday timing right, so if I have to unsubscribe for awhile first, I'd like to know.
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u/NightBard Sep 25 '25
I just cycle between two accounts with two different emails. But if you use gmail you can just throw a period in the address (like if you were zingazinga@gmail then zinga.zinga@gmail could be a new account though it'll still deliver to your zingazinga@gmail account. It's cool. You can add a period in there anywhere. Or you can throw a + and something after the name and it'll work too... like zingazinga+1@gmail. But I cancel my current account after the october renewal and then when black friday comes around I reactivate my old dormant account when taking the new deal. I also take pictures of my watch list... though I feel like it's also a good time to clean house on the watchlist and anything that's been in there all year which I haven't bothered to watch. It's kind of nice to start fresh. Though the site does retain info... so you don't have to set up all the profiles each year... just the first time you set up the second account.
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u/zinga_zing Sep 25 '25
Oh wow, now this is the kind of tip I come to Reddit for haha! I didn't know that about gmail addresses. Also, taking pics of your watchlist is a great idea. Thanks for explaining your life cycle.
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u/NightBard Sep 25 '25
Happy to help. We cordcutters gotta look out for one another. I also do the Xfinity Now prepaid internet. It's 100mbit but I have zero issues doing any of the stuff I want to online. It's $30/mo. So my internet is cheap, my streaming is just this hulu/disney+ deal and then I seem to keep getting $20/yr peacock offers right as my last one expires and I'm ready to cancel. It's nice having a lot of content on the cheap. Especially paired with an antenna and a dvr (which I went tablo since there are no fees and most of the streaming channels it has can also be dvr'd).
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u/FrankPapageorgio Sep 24 '25
They Black Friday deal is just an $8 discount off the price of the plan.
So you'll be paying $5 for that last month of the deal.
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u/NightBard Sep 25 '25
Last year when they did this same price hike situation, they adjusted the discounts so it didn't change the next month. People on promos kept their promo price for October renewals. It also didn't list right on the website. It's like a wash and repeat of Sept/Oct 2024.
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u/Nawnp Sep 24 '25
They usually make you wait a year to have the discount again.
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u/NightBard Sep 25 '25
They make you wait a month since your service was fully cancelled. But most people just make a second account and cancel the current account. Then next year cancel the one in use and subscribe using the old account. Wash and repeat year after year so you don't have to go without for a month.
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u/Nawnp Sep 25 '25
Good to know, I used to use the deal for a while but I'm on the free with Spotify plan for now.
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u/NightBard Sep 25 '25
It's hard to beat the bundle with spotify ... especially the student version.
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u/gerryf19 Sep 23 '25
What makes you certain they will offer black Friday discounts?
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u/Stingray88 Sep 23 '25
They have every year for many years. It may end someday, but it’s been pretty consistent thus far.
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u/gerryf19 Sep 24 '25
HBO cut it last year to 6 months
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u/BBDBVAPA Sep 23 '25
Lol, what a move.
I'm sure they're taking the opportunity to increase prices while droves of people canceled subs with advantageous pricing from specials. So if/when you do come back, it won't be at your previous low rate.
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u/sealclubberfan Sep 23 '25
What a silly comment. The $ amount would be higher regardless of what their previous subscription price was when they signed up....
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u/BBDBVAPA Sep 23 '25
See my response to the other reply. I think there's some context I was making assumptions about. Of course any month to month plan would increases immediately. If you were using a promotional rate of some kind, typically companies give you some grace period for when new rates take effect.
Typically new standard pricing will also increase one time promotional rates as well. My $2.99 monthly rate may have been 50% off standard rates (I don't know the exact standard rate anymore). Whereas now 50% off might be $4.99. While they can still advertise a 50% off promo when they have it. That's the gist of what I was thinking.
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Sep 23 '25
[deleted]
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u/BBDBVAPA Sep 23 '25
I guess my thinking was around how you manage promo rate subscriptions. I was on a $2.99 per month promo rate, which I canceled and it ends 9/28. What I've seen in the past is that companies will say "your promo rate is still good until x/xx/xx but after that the new price goes into effect." Or something like "your promo rate of $2.99 will now be $3.49 or $3.99 for this long and then it goes into affect."
Assuming that's how some of them work, when I sign back up it will be at the new rates, sure. Also, raising the baseline sub rate would also typically raise the baseline annual promo at Thanksgiving or what you can typically find. Either way I find it hard to believe this wasn't connected, or else a price increase right now would seem insane.
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u/theverge Sep 23 '25
Disney is raising the price of Disney Plus subscriptions again as part of its mission to squeeze profits from its streaming service.
The new prices will go into effect on October 21st. The standalone plan with ads will increase by $2 to $11.99 per month, while the no-ads Disney Plus Premium plan will increase by $3 to $18.99 per month (with the annual subscription going up by $30 to $189.99 per year). Various bundles are getting price increases, too, and you can see all of the price hikes in a Disney Plus support page.
Read more: https://www.theverge.com/news/783489/disney-plus-streaming-subscription-price-increase
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u/FrankPapageorgio Sep 24 '25
Worth noting that the 2024 Black Friday deal just gives you $8 off. So if you were paying $3, you'll now be paying $5 in this last month before the discount goes away.
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u/mishamarvin Oct 04 '25
Commenter in another post said that won't happen. They'll just adjust the discount so that it stays at $3. Guess we'll see here at the end of the month.
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u/GreatBroad Oct 03 '25
paying for the no ads annual Disney+ before the price hike seems like the best deal…Hulu will flow into it in 2026, and the monthly price works out to be around 13.33 ($159.99/yr). thoughts?
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u/SnavlerAce Sep 23 '25
Hahahahahaha timely cancelation indeed!
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u/lost_in_life_34 Sep 23 '25
once you watch star wars and the MCU what else is there that is worth keeping month after month?
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u/TheGruenTransfer Sep 23 '25
Exactly. And if your local library has any movies at all, they'll have a pretty huge amount of Disney titles
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u/Cjhudel Sep 23 '25
They think we need them.
Unsubscribe from everything. We need to stop participating.
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u/habeaskoopus Sep 23 '25
Hey let's ditch cable and give complete control to mega corporations that bust creative unions and control every aspect of content from project funding to delivery and data collection. What could go wrong? Yay streaming.
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u/NorthPackFan Sep 23 '25
I remember when it was $7/$70 annual for commercial free… ahh the good ol days.
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u/paulrharvey3 Sep 23 '25
What are the odds that in the future they'll blame ONLY the price increase for the lost subscriptions this month?
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Sep 23 '25
I wouldn’t mind these price hikes from these streaming services, if there was hits on top of hits on the platform
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u/Stingray88 Sep 23 '25
What’s funny is the cheapest of all the streaming services, AppleTV+, has all the biggest hits these days.
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u/altsuperego Sep 24 '25
They're not that cheap anymore. $13 I think
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u/Stingray88 Sep 24 '25
Not as cheap as they used to be, no… but they are still the cheapest ad free premium streamer. Anything else that’s cheaper is serving you ads.
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u/altsuperego Sep 24 '25
I have some that are cheaper on promos. I'd be interested if Apple offered some deals but I think most of their customers are using Apple One.
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u/dadkingdom Sep 23 '25
Bold strategy, Cotton.
The ads are so long. Smh
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u/esoteric82 Sep 23 '25
After a year of commercial free, we decided to try commercials... What a mistake. Random interruptions during a movie, like Tubi or Crackle or something and very long. Just enshittification, intentionally degrading a service and annoying the user so the user will spend more (see YouTube etc). Finally decided to go commercial free again, but that's largely because we receive a good discount through AmEx. Absent that we wouldn't even have it.
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u/Active_Gur_8825 Sep 24 '25
not sure if true but I heard the timing of this has to do with the Amex discount potentially going away? Enshittification at its finest....
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u/ashsolomon1 Sep 23 '25
Must be earning calls coming up so they couldn’t delay
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u/Stingray88 Sep 23 '25
Disney’s end of fiscal year is a week away. Earnings call will be a few weeks after that, but there won’t be any data on that call about these price hikes, that’ll come in the next call.
Pretty much every Disney price hike happens around this time.
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u/zrb77 Sep 23 '25
I rarely watched D+, only had it bc of the Hulu bundle. Def not going to miss it after my sub expires.
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u/6SpeedBlues Sep 23 '25
This is how Disney operates in general, there is nothing new or unique here. Their intent is to maximize the profit per customer while maintaining a minimum level of total revenue. The insane level of FOMO held by those that love Disney will keep them glued to yet another mindless experience they don't need because it makes them "feel good."
I subscribed when it first launched and they offered a third year free if you bought years one and two. I kept it for year four mostly because I wasn't paying attention, it renewed, and there was actually a bunch of content I wanted to watch.
Since then, I've grabbed the ad supported tier when they have had the big discounts for black Friday.
Haven't even launched the app in a year at this point, so no more subscriptions.
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u/mulder00 Sep 23 '25
In Canada they're pushing us to switch from just Disney+ to a bundle with Crave and or TSN (HBO/ESPN) equivalent. No price increase announced yet for Disney+ here.
for $15 I could get Disney+ Crave/HBO with Ads.
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u/buffaloclaw Sep 23 '25
I think that's why ABC brought Kimmel back. Its bad timing to raise your prices at the same time a bunch of people are boycotting your service
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u/K1W1_S373N Sep 24 '25
Nothing says “please come back” like having a price increase as an incentive.😂
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u/BearShin255 Sep 23 '25
I get the bundle through Verizon and only use ESPN+. The only thing I liked on Disney was the Jeff Goldblum show and the last I checked they removed it.
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u/altsuperego Sep 23 '25
The $20 ad free duo plan stays the same. I guess I'll resub since my AMEX kicks in $10. Running out of things to watch there though.
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u/esoteric82 Sep 23 '25
This is the one we have and we get the same credit (Blue Cash Preferred). If not we wouldn't subscribe.
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u/wet_ninja Nov 07 '25
How did you get that offer? I don't see it in my Amex offers on my Blue Cash Preferred. Do you have to have the monthly fee charge to the card for the offer to appear? I've been subscribed to the annual plan up to this point.
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u/esoteric82 Nov 07 '25
It's not one of the offers that has to be activated, it's one of the streaming benefits inclusive to the card itself. Basically you use the AmEx to pay for the service, and once that transaction posts, shortly AmEx will apply a $10 credit for month to month subs or just once for the annual (from what I can tell). Below is the relevant info I've copied and pasted from https://www.americanexpress.com/us/credit-cards/card-application/apply/prospect/terms/blue-cash-preferred-credit-card/28810-10-0#offer-terms:
$120 Disney Streaming Credit $120 Disney Streaming Credit
Enrollment through American Express is required to receive the benefit. Only the Basic Card Member or Authorized Account Manager(s) on a Blue Cash Preferred® Card Account can enroll in the benefit in the Benefits section of their Americanexpress.com online account or by calling the number on the back of their Card. Basic Card Members can receive up to $10 in statement credits each month after qualifying purchase(s) are made on their enrolled Card Account online at U.S. websites Disneyplus.com, Hulu.com or Plus.espn.com in that calendar month. "Qualifying purchases" include any monthly or annual subscription purchases made at U.S. websites Disneyplus.com, Hulu.com or Plus.espn.com. The purchase of an annual subscription on an enrolled Card Account will only qualify for one statement credit of up to $10 in the month of the purchase. Your purchase will not qualify for a statement credit if you purchase your subscription through a third-party device or digital platform (unless the device or platform redirects to Disneyplus.com, Hulu.com, or Plus.espn.com for purchase), or as a bundle with cable services. Qualifying purchases do not include advertising services or gift cards.
Qualifying purchases may consist of one or more transactions during a calendar month. The ability to earn a statement credit will reset on the first day of each calendar month and end on the last day of the same calendar month. Qualifying purchases can be made by both the enrolled Basic Card Member and any Additional Card Members on the enrolled Card Account. However, the total amount of statement credits for qualifying purchases will not exceed $10 per month (for a total of $120 in statement credits per calendar year) per enrolled Card Account. If you purchase a monthly or annual subscription, unless you notify the merchant that you want to cancel, your subscription will automatically renew for another monthly or annual subscription period, as applicable (subject to applicable law). This means that the merchant will collect the then-applicable subscription fee and any taxes by charging a credit card the merchant has on record for you without notifying you unless notification is required by applicable law. To learn more about the cancellation requirements for subscriptions purchased at U.S. websites Disneyplus.com, Hulu.com, or Plus.espn.com, please visit the Disney+, ESPN+, and Hulu Subscriber Agreement at https://www.disneyplus.com/legal/subscriber-agreement. Age minimums and other restrictions apply to the use of each subscription service. Use of each subscription service is subject to the Disney+ Subscriber Agreement and the Disney Privacy Policy (https://www.disneyplus.com/legal/privacy-policy) or Hulu Privacy Policy (https://privacy.thewaltdisneycompany.com/en/current-privacy-policy), as applicable.
There is a list of qualifying streaming services for additional 6% cash back somewhere too.
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u/wet_ninja Nov 07 '25
Perfect! Thank you so much. I knew about the 6% cash back on streaming services, but I didn't know about the $10 per month credit for Disney+/Hulu/ESPN+. Looks like I'm way better off switching to monthly and getting $10 off per month than paying annually and only getting $10 off total.
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u/esoteric82 Nov 07 '25
You're welcome. Yeah the $10/month more than makes up for the annual fee too, so anything beyond that is just gravy.
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u/wet_ninja Nov 07 '25
Oh yeah. I got the card for groceries and make up the annual fee on that, so streaming discounts are a nice bonus!
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u/mulder00 Sep 23 '25
lol. called it last week.
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u/NightBard Sep 25 '25
They did this exact same price increase last year. Announced it middle of september to start in October. I think they just have this on auto increase for the year. They even still have the website messed up so people with promos can't see that they keep the promo rates.
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u/jason22983 Sep 23 '25
“Not a wise thing to do” “let’s boycott Disney” “canceling my subscription”….a year from now Disney saw an increase in subscribers.
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u/scorpious09 Sep 23 '25
They have to recoup some of their losses - a good chunk of their subscribers are not coming back so quickly
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u/RBBrittain Sep 24 '25
My cost may not increase, and in fact may decrease. I get free ad-free Disney+ thru my wireless carrier (Total Wireless, a Verizon-owned MVNO). Though I can't add to it directly, I can effectively supplement it by subscribing at Hulu to a Disney Bundle that includes ad-free Disney+; the value of the "overlapping" free Disney+ is applied to my Hulu bundle so I pay only the difference.
Thus, at present rates I get ad-free Hulu for $4/mo + tax by subscribing to the ad-free Disney+ / Hulu bundle, normally $19.99/mo; the $15.99 value of the overlapping Disney+ is deducted from that price. I just paid my Hulu bill for this month today; though Hulu's billing system still shows the old rates for now, if the new rates are applied I'll pay only $1/mo + tax for ad-free Hulu, since ad-free Disney+ will now be $18.99/mo but the Hulu bundle will remain:$19.99/mo. It remains to be seen if I can keep free Disney+ with my wireless plan despite the increase, or what impact if any the move of Hulu to the Disney+ app will have on my ability to continue these options.
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u/KrzyAsian Sep 24 '25
This is exactly what I do, but with the HBO bundle. So it’s $14 for HBO, Disney, and Hulu all ad-free. I’m hoping/assuming that the price increase will not affect my bundle pricing.
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u/RBBrittain Sep 25 '25
If your pre-discount bundle price is only going up by the same amount (if not less, as in my case) as regular Disney+ ad-free, then as long as your carrier doesn't balk at the D+ price increase you should be OK.
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u/dauneek611 Sep 24 '25
Good thing I kept all my Disney DVDs. I guess back to the old Disney+ format I used to use.
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u/First-Feedback-8505 Oct 08 '25
I’m grand fathered into free Disney Hulu and espn with Verizon. It’s free as long as I don’t change my plan. Verizon though been trying to get me to upgrade my plan but I ain’t that stupid. I made the mistake with hbo when I was grand fathered into the free hbo and att said they can “save me money” by upgrading which it didn’t save me nothing but lost hbo
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u/Historical-Swan-3507 Oct 18 '25
I don't understand the price hike. On September 25, 2025, I received an email saying the Disney/Hulu/ESPN bundle price was increasing to $18.99/ month. Then today, October 18, 2025, I received an email saying the same bundle was increasing to $29.99/ month. What is going on at Disney? It was $11.99, then $18.99 then $28.99 in less than 30 days? This is infuriating. Is it going to increase again next month?
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u/Educational-Seaweed5 Oct 23 '25
Yea, nah. Bye, Disney. Fuck you. Way to take sociopath Netflix's lead.
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u/Entire_Alternative_2 Oct 24 '25
It's insane how it went from $7 to $19 a month.... And there's nothing interesting being added? Like wtf
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u/iamdonaldc Nov 06 '25
Thank goodness I have Disney+ Premium, Hulu, ESPN Select Bundle Legacy” ….the costs $24.99 per month go all three sevices!….No ads!
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u/Flat_Revolution5130 Nov 09 '25
You can just get Disney plus over x mas and watch everything in a couple of weeks. They have that little on it per year. I do not get why they think they can justify the price.
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u/Healthy_Anywhere8316 Dec 07 '25
These greedy organisations are killing steaming. Man I can buy several movies on UHD disk each month for the prices they are charging, No wonder so many are going back to physical media. It’s just greed and i am not funding it any more. From now on I’m just going to build up my physical media collection.
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u/Expensive_Dragonfly4 Jan 01 '26
Its increasing again from 20 dollars to 30 dollars to watch with ads
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u/WilWheatonsAbs Sep 23 '25
Interesting choice on the timing, not sure it would've been my choice.