Microsoft has announced a new price hike and overhaul of its Xbox Game Pass subscription service structure and offerings, while creating a brand new tier.
The first price hike is Xbox Game Pass Ultimate which is increasing from $16.99 to $19.99 per month – the features of this tier are not changing. PC Game Pass is also increasing in price from $9.99 to $11.99 per month and will remain unchanged.
The basic level $9.99 Xbox Game Pass tier will become unavailable tomorrow, July 10th, and will be replaced by a $14.99 “Xbox Game Pass Standard” tier.
The new Xbox Game Pass Standard tier will no longer have access to first-party games on day one and does not have cloud gaming, though it will now have multiplayer access on console (previously this was only an Ultimate tier perk).
Despite cutting off their baseline Game Pass tier, the company will let existing Xbox Game Pass subscriptions to continue but new users will only be able to go Standard or Ultimate after the changes happen. The new Xbox Game Pass Standard tier will roll out in the coming months.
Unlike previous Xbox Game Pass price hikes that affected most non-American countries, the new prices are global – you can check your new regional pricing here.
Furthermore, beginning on September 18th users will no longer be able to stack more than 13 months of Xbox Game Pass vouchers (users did this with monthly vouchers on sale to save big), though the stacking feature will remain in that limited amount (and won’t affect existing stacks of redeemed vouchers).
