Xbox Now Says It Will Have To Increase Prices, But To What?

Games Xbox Now Says It Will Have To Increase Prices, But To What? Paul Tassi Senior Contributor Opinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own. News and opinion about video games, television, movies and the internet. Following New! Follow this author to stay notified about their latest stories.

Got it! Oct 29, 2022, 10:29am EDT | New! Click on the conversation bubble to join the conversation Got it! Share to Facebook Share to Twitter Share to Linkedin Xbox Series S Microsoft While Microsoft was happy to announce no current plans to increase Xbox-related prices even as Meta and PlayStation started to raise their asking price on hardware, the emphasis there was on “current” plans. Now, facing a global recession and ever-increasing costs, Phil Spencer is now saying price hikes likely will be coming to services like Xbox Game Pass and to Xbox consoles themselves. That’s what he said at a recent WSJ Live event: “I do think at some point we’ll have to raise the prices on certain things, but going into this holiday we thought it was important to maintain the prices.

” So no last minute hike for the holidays, but 2023 appears to be fair game. But what exactly would those price increases look like? Well, we have a few examples to look at. If we’re talking about the Xbox consoles themselves, we can look at the PS5 price hikes, which as of yet have not come to the US, but in most regions it was about a 10% or $50 equivalent price hike for the consoles.

For some regions, depending on the currency, it was as much as nearly 25%. So, if Microsoft follows suit, that would mean would could see the Xbox Series S priced new at $350, up from $300. The Xbox Series X would go to $550, up from $500.

Though again, Sony didn’t raise prices in the US, and it’s unknown if the US-based Microsoft wouldn’t either. Microsoft has enough issues in international markets already where upping prices overseas could cause problems, so it may be a bit of a different situation. But overall I doubt prices would go up any less than in $50 increments.

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All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed. As for Xbox Game Pass, that’s a different story.

While prices have remained locked for Game Pass almost since its inception, like with all subscription services, that seems subject to change, especially with current economic conditions. Spencer recently confirmed that Game Pass is 10-15% of Microsoft’s gaming revenue, and is profitable, but what if…it was more profitable? Hence, a price increase. Xbox Game Pass by itself is $10 a month.

Game Pass Ultimate, which includes Xbox Live, is $15 a month, though you can get discounts through bundles. I guess we can use Netflix as a comparison point here, and I’ll just go with “Standard” Netflix pricing. November 2010 – $8 May 2014 – $9 October 2015 – $10 October 2017 – $11 January 2019 – $13 October 2022 – $16 So yes, Netflix’s price has essentially doubled in a little more than a decade, though I suppose the volume of content on the service has increased by way more than that.

Still, we can see when price increases do happen, they’re incremental, like a frog slowly boiling in water. I would not expect a price increase of more than $1-2 for Xbox Game Pass, so maybe $12 by itself and $17 for Ultimate. I would envision a giant YouTube Premium hike where they just upped the price by five full dollars a month.

Still, Xbox Game Pass sticking to its price has been a big selling point, though as we can see, that’s kind of how these services start out. Netflix went four years before its first notable price increase. Xbox Game Pass first arrived in 2017, so an increase in 2023 would be an even longer wait, although the scope of what Game Pass is has clearly changed over time.

Still, a price increase after this long is far from a huge shock. We’ll see how it manifests next year, most likely. Follow me on Twitter , YouTube , Facebook and Instagram .

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