In case the hubbub of the holidays made you forget all about (or completely miss) Amazon’s news about putting ads in Prime Video next week, we’re here to remind you that commercials are coming on Monday, January 29th — unless you pay more money, of course.
Amazon just so happened to break the news right after Christmas, leaving a lovely email in users’ inboxes (that most people probably weren’t even checking at that time) to announce the rollout of ads. The new ad-free plan will cost an extra $2.99 per month, bringing your $14.99 per month Prime subscription to $17.98 per month or your $8.99 per month standalone Prime Video subscription to $11.98 per month. You won’t be automatically transferred to the new ad-free plan, but you can “preorder” the new tier from Amazon’s website.
Amazon says it’s making the change to allow it “to continue investing in compelling content and keep increasing that investment over a long period of time.” We also don’t know how many ads Amazon will show on the ad-supported tier, but it says it aims to “have meaningfully fewer ads than linear TV and other streaming TV providers.”
The company first announced plans to bring ads to Prime Video last September, and it’s not alone in making the change. Both Netflix and Disney Plus have also started incorporating commercials as streamers look to advertising as another source of revenue. Prime Video was one of the last big holdouts in rolling out ad-supported streaming, as Max, Paramount Plus, Hulu, and Peacock all offer plans with ads — now, all that’s left is Apple TV Plus.
Source: www.theverge.com
