Lucy Acheson
Business reporter
Netflix has increased its subscription prices in the UK, after it raised its charges in the US, Canada, Argentina and Portugal last month.
The new UK price for a Standard subscription without adverts, the platform’s most popular plan, has risen by £2 to £12.99 a month, with other packages also increasing.
A spokesperson said the hike would allow Netflix to “continue to invest in programming and deliver more value for our members”.
The streaming service reported record global subscriber numbers at the end of 2024, driven in part by its expanding sports coverage.
Netflix’s price increases – the first in the UK since October 2023 – will affect all subscription plans.
The Standard subscription with adverts is rising by £1 to £5.99 a month, while the most expensive Premium subscription is also increasing by £1 to £18.99 a month.
The platform is also increasing the cost of its Extra Member add-ons by £1.
For a Standard subscription with adverts, the fee to add an extra member will go up from £3.99 to £4.99.
Meanwhile, for a Standard subscription without adverts, the fee for an extra member will rise from £4.99 to £5.99.
Netflix has reflected the price changes on its website, with the new prices applying to both new and existing customers.
“We will occasionally ask our members to pay a little more so that we can re-invest to further improve Netflix,” the streamer said.
Paolo Pescatore, a technology analyst at PP Foresight, said Netflix’s subscription increases were “widely expected”.
“The streaming business is following mainstream TV in its price rises, and we should get accustomed to them.”
However, he added: “Netflix must tread extremely carefully… there is a ceiling, a point at which consumers will become incredibly frustrated by price hikes.”
Netflix is not the only platform to raise its subscription costs – streaming giants such as Disney+, Spotify, and Paramount+ also increased their prices worldwide in 2024.
Netflix began enforcing a password-sharing ban in May 2023 in the UK and the US, which led to millions of new signups over the following year.
The company said it finished 2024 with more than 300 million subscribers in total.
It had been expected to add 9.6 million new subscribers between October and December but far surpassed that number, adding nearly 19 million subscribers in the final months of the year.
Netflix says its huge increase in streamers was helped by the second series of South Korean drama Squid Game as well as the expansion of its sports coverage.
The platform streamed two NFL games on Christmas Day and hosted a boxing match between influencer-turned-fighter Jake Paul and former world heavyweight champion Mike Tyson.
Net profit between October and December doubled from a year earlier to $1.8bn, while sales rose from $8.8bn to $10.2bn.
