The Submo Streaming Price Index

The index tracks the published US list price of one named plan per service. Where a service sells both an ad-supported and an ad-free tier, we follow the ad-free one, because it is the tier whose price has actually moved and the one most people mean when they name a price.

Prices are recorded in the month they took effect for new subscribers. Existing subscribers are typically moved one to two billing cycles later, so an individual bill may lag the series by a month or two.

Every price point cites the report that documented the change. When a report states a new price “up from $X”, or dates the previous increase, we treat that article as a record of the earlier point as well. Nothing is interpolated: a service holds its last documented price until the next documented change, which is why the chart steps rather than slopes.

It is based at January 2021, the earliest month in which all five existed in the US; HBO Max launched last, in May 2020. An earlier base would mean inventing prices for services that had not shipped.

This is a list-price index, not a measure of what anyone pays. It ignores bundles, annual plans, promotional rates, student and carrier deals, and password sharing, all of which push real spending below the figures here. Deloitte's survey work finds US households actually spend about $69 a month on streaming across roughly four services, in part because most have moved to ad-supported tiers as prices rose.

It also is not a cost-of-living measure. The basket is a fixed set of five subscriptions, so it deliberately does not adjust for people substituting a cheaper tier or dropping a service, which is exactly the behaviour the survey data above shows. Read it as “what the shelf price of this shelf did”, not “what streaming costs households”.

It is US-only, and it contains no Submo user data of any kind. Every number on this page comes from public reporting, and can be checked against the sources below.