The Streaming Wars is already crowded enough with services like Netflix, Hulu, Amazon, and about a dozen other smaller companies duking it out, trying to get every last dollar from consumers. And adding to the mess is the upcoming services from Apple and Disney, launching later this year. Not to be outdone, and arriving fashionably late to the party, WarnerMedia is ready to launch its own streaming service. However, the studio faces an uphill battle with a 2020 launch and a pretty high price point.
According to a new report from the Wall Street Journal (via The Verge), the still-untitled WarnerMedia streaming service is expected to launch in March 2020 and cost “between $16 and $17 a month.” Now, your immediate reaction to that price point and launch date is that the studio is late to the game and coming in way too pricey. But the price actually makes sense.
WarnerMedia thinks it can justify the high price-tag (nearly 3 times the cost of Disney+), by offering HBO and Cinemax bundled together, along with the vast Warner Bros. library of films and TV series. Currently, an HBO Now subscription alone costs $15 per month, making the WarnerMedia cost seem surprisingly low. That being said, even if the streaming service can justify the cost, that doesn’t solve the other major issues.
The uphill battle in front of WarnerMedia seems to be two-fold. Taking the need for original content out of the equation (that sort of thing is a done deal and is not even an issue for a company as big as this), the real questions are “Is it too late?” and “Will this prevent people from borrowing their relative’s HBO password?”
The former is hard to answer, as we’ll know more when Disney+ and Apple TV+ launch later this year. If those two massive companies can’t compete in the marketplace, then WarnerMedia is screwed. The latter question might be the most interesting.
HBO Now and HBO Go are proving to be very popular ways for subscribers to consume the network’s content. However, it’s also a widely recognized joke that many of the people who watch the shows probably aren’t the ones paying for the service, as passwords are given fairly frequently among family members and friends. That being said, combining HBO, Cinemax, and the WB library together is an enticing proposition for any fan of film and TV. And if the service can somehow include a struggling streaming service that is in the news lately (*cough*DC Universe*cough*), then perhaps WarnerMedia can truly compete with the big boys in the streaming marketplace.
But until we know all the details, it appears that we should all get ready to part ways with even more streaming money next year.