Twitch is lowering the price of a channel subscription on the platform for viewers across Europe as a part of its local subscription pricing, it announced today.
The program that started earlier this year with Turkey and Mexico expanded to Latin America, the Middle East, and Africa at the end of last month. And now, European viewers are getting a reduced cost.
For most European countries, the local subscription pricing changes will drop the cost of a subscription to €3.99. Prior to today, it cost €4.99. In the U.K., the price of a sub has dropped to £3.99 from £4.99.
Twitch originally implemented the new local subscription pricing model in May, citing vast differences between the percentage of viewers in different areas that were subscribed to channels.
“The percentage of active users in Europe or Asia who support creators with a subscription is roughly 50% lower relative to North America,” Twitch said. “In Latin America, it’s nearly 80% lower.”
By testing lower subscription prices in areas, the hope was that “more people than ever can feel comfortable showing their support and enjoying the benefits of a subscription.”
In places like the U.K., the price drop was almost more about evening out the value of a sub in the country compared to the U.S. At £4.99, Twitch subscriptions in the U.K. came out to around $7, about $2 more than what Americans pay for a sub.
While the change in subscription prices will lower revenue per sub, the platform conducted tests suggesting the reductions will increase subscriber counts at a rate that will more than make up for the price drop, according to Twitch’s blog post.
Because the change had the potential to lower revenue for streamers in the short term, Twitch also implemented a system to make sure that streamers didn’t see a change in their personal revenue for the first few months following price changes. For streamers who have largely European fan bases, it will be important for them to read the eligibility guidelines for this system to make sure they’re getting support from Twitch while their subscription revenue goes through some changes.
