Pay up or no The Office for you.
NBC’s Peacock streaming service stood out for a number of reasons: it’s why The Office is no longer on Netflix, a selection of terrible avatars, a stupid name that makes juvenile people laugh. But the most notable was that it was the only one of the big company streamers to offer a completely free, ad-supported tier, albeit with a somewhat stripped down selection of content.
Well, the bad news is, per Streamable, if you want to sign up for Peacock now, you no longer have that free plan as an option. Get out that credit card, my friend, ’cause you’re paying now. Now, you only have two options: an ad-supported Premium plan ($4.99 monthly/$49.99 yearly), or an ad-free Premium Plus plan ($9.99 monthly/$99.99 yearly), though there is a deal active to get one year of the ad-supported plan for $29.99.
That said, the free tier isn’t totally gone… yet. Those who were already signed up for it will retain access, though who knows for how long. And anyone with a paid account that cancels will also retain access to the free catalogue.
An NBC spokeperson speaking to Gizmodo told them that this move is meant to refocus things on their premium options. In addition, they claimed that the majority of their subscribers were subscribed via the paid tiers of which there were 20 million subscribers. Though they didn’t give any numbers for the subscribers of the free tier.
This shouldn’t come as much of a surprise, considering parent company Comcast’s recent quarterly earnings report. According to that Peacock was basically hemorrhaging money for the company. in the fourth quarter of 2022, the service alone managed to lose a whopping $978 million. So the loss of the free tier isn’t terribly surprising.
The good news right now is that the pricing hasn’t changed. And there are no plans to change it either, according to that spokesperson. That all being said, there’s no telling when the free tier is going to go entirely. So if there’s something you want to watch that you have access to in the free tier, it might be a good idea to get while the getting is good.
Source: Gizmodo
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