Peacock is peacocking ahead of the 2024 Summer Olympics: the NBCUniversal streaming service is raising its monthly rates by $2 on both its Premium and Premium Plus plans. The new rates go into effect for new customers on July 18 — the Paris Olympics start on the 26th.
Existing customers will get the Olympics at their current rate: the price hike for them will hold until August 17 at the earliest (dependent on billing date). The Olympics close on August 11.
Peacock Premium will now cost $7.99 per month or $79.99 per year. Peacock Premium Plus, the ad-free tier, will run $13.99 per month or $139.99 per year. Premium Plus members can also download content and get live, local NBC channels.
It could use the money: Peacock lost $639 million in the first quarter of 2024. The company has not announced a profitability timeline.
Peacock has “nearly 100,000 programming hours,” the company says. Of those, 8,000 are live sports — not counting the 5,000 coming from the Olympics this summer.
Though the Paris games are clearly the impetus for the increase, Peacock is having a nice start to 2024. “Oppenheimer,” the “Ted” series, and “The Traitors” were highlights, but nothing was is ever as big as football.
Peacock hosted the NFL’s first-ever streaming-exclusive playoff game on January 13. It did not go over well with NFL fans who did not already have Peacock. Though many grumbled, several million signed up for the streamer in the 72-hour period ahead of the Miami Dolphins vs. Kansas City Chiefs game, which averaged 23 million viewers. Peacock ended the March quarter with 34 million subscribers, 3 million more than it started with.
Better get used to it. Peacock will exclusively stream the Week 1 game in São Paulo, Brazil on Friday, September 6. It will be the NFL’s first-ever regular season game in South America and the first time the league has played a game on Friday night of its opening weekend in more than 50 years. The Philadelphia Eagles are the first team to be announced for the game; their opponent and the kickoff time will be determined later.
Amazon Prime Video gets the streaming-only playoff game next season.
Peacock was originally set to launch with the 2020 Summer Olympics. When COVID ruined all of that, the streamer experienced a flat start. Here’s to 2024.
