Peacock has now removed the option to sign up and watch for free, marking a major change to the streaming service. Unlike many other streaming services, Peacock no longer offers a free trial, and while this was previously offset by the ability to watch a limited selection of content without paying, that’s no longer the case.
Peacock has offered new users three tiered options since launch. For those that want to check the service out for free before signing up they could through the free plan which unlocked acces to a variety of episodes and movies. Those that were ready to sign up could either subscribe to the Premium plan at $4.99 per month or the ad-free Premium Plus plan at $9.99 per month. These Premium tiers not only unlock access to the entire Peacock library but also live events and sports.
Now, however, Peacock is only offering the option to sign up to a paid Premium plan. It is unclear when exactly the change was made but Reddit users started noticing the lack of a free option late last night. Whether it is through the Peacock website or through any of the platform apps, the streaming service now requires new users to subscribe to Premium or Plus before gaining access to any of the content.
In addition to the lack of a free tier, Peacock also hasn’t reintroduced a free trial either. In the past, Peacock did offer the option to sign up to either Premium plan and watch for free for the first 7 days. This was in addition to the availability of the free tier for those that didn’t want to commit to a payment when signing up.
Apparently, the change has been made to ensure that when someone signs up to Peacock they are now actually getting a full picture of what the streaming service has to offer and not just the limited selection of content previously available with the free tier. That’s according to The Streamable, citing an unnamed NBCU source who confirmed that the free tier is no longer available to new users. According to the source, existing users will be able to continue accessing the free version of Peacock.
Peacock recently confirmed that it has passed 20 million paid subscribers and also recently dropped the extended free trial for Cox customers. So maybe it now simply feels as though it offers enough, and has generated enough brand awareness, to not worry about offering new users a free tier or trial.
To be honest, Peacock is not alone in this respect as Disney Plus, HBO Max, and Netflix have also abandoned their free trials in recent years. For what it’s worth, Peacock did recently launch a new promotion that makes it possible to sign up for the ad-supported Premium plan for as little as $29.99 per year, a saving of $20 on the usual cost.
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