Anime-centric streaming service Crunchyroll is raising its monthly subscription fee to $7.99 per month (up from $6.95 per month), the company announced in an email to its two million paying subscribers.
Current members will have until August 1 before they are affected by the change, while all new sign-ups after May 1 will be enrolled at the new rate of $7.99 per month. Members who have prepaid for a year’s worth of Crunchyroll will see no change to their pricing until that year is up. Meanwhile, international Crunchyroll subscribers who are paying in USD will also be a part of the new subscription pricing, excluding Brazil.
The $1.05 increase comes as a direct result of a rising cost of content and infrastructure, a spokesperson told TheWrap. Crunchyroll, which is run by AT&T’s Ellation, has one of world’s largest anime collections with 1,000-plus titles — a small but growing number of which are produced by Crunchyroll as original content.
“We are grateful to have focused on building out such a robust library for over the last decade, without a significant price change in our company history,” the spokesperson said. “However, due to rising costs of content and infrastructure, now is the time to introduce new subscription pricing.”
“This price increase will help us bring our community more of their favorite shows, allowing us to create even more experiences for them to connect with each other and through shared passion for anime.” added the spokesperson, explaining that price increase will not impact the monthly subscription cost of Ellation’s VRV, a streaming platform that bundles a mix of 12 anime-centric OTT services, including Crunchyroll, for a monthly cost of $9.99 per month.
Launched in 2006, Crunchyroll is a global streaming platform with more than 45 million registered users and 2 million paying subscribers, along with 29 million followers across its social platforms.