CPI taken from https://www.bls.gov/data/inflation_calculator.htm
I fudged the CPI calculation a bit because I didn't do the compounding monthly, but I ensured that based on the CPI calculator, the starting value of $11.99 -> $16.43 from January 2013 -> December 2024.
To be fair, I think CPI is somewhat bullshit, but it was the easiest .gov source for inflation data that I knew about.
Data:
Year |
Basic |
Standard with Ads |
Standard |
Premium |
Premium Following CPI |
CPI Inflation % |
2011 |
$7.99 |
- |
- |
– |
- |
- |
2012 |
$7.99 |
- |
- |
– |
- |
1.60% |
2013 |
$7.99 |
- |
$9.99 |
$11.99 |
$11.99 |
1.58% |
2014 |
$7.99 |
- |
$10.99 |
$13.99 |
$12.19 |
-0.89% |
2015 |
$7.99 |
- |
$11.99 |
$14.99 |
$12.09 |
1.37% |
2016 |
$7.99 |
- |
$11.99 |
$14.99 |
$12.26 |
2.50% |
2017 |
$7.99 |
- |
$12.99 |
$15.99 |
$12.57 |
2.07% |
2018 |
$7.99 |
- |
$12.99 |
$15.99 |
$12.84 |
1.55% |
2019 |
$8.99 |
- |
$13.99 |
$16.99 |
$13.05 |
2.49% |
2020 |
$8.99 |
- |
$14.99 |
$18.99 |
$13.38 |
1.40% |
2021 |
$8.99 |
- |
$14.99 |
$18.99 |
$13.58 |
7.48% |
2022 |
$9.99 |
- |
$15.49 |
$19.99 |
$14.60 |
6.41% |
2023 |
Phased Out |
$6.99 |
$15.49 |
$19.99 |
$15.55 |
3.09% |
2024 |
– |
$6.99 |
$15.49 |
$22.99 |
$16.04 |
2.33% |
2025 |
– |
$7.99 |
$17.99 |
$24.99 |
$16.43 |
- |
edit: Zeroed y axis
While I fully agree Netflix is gouging customers.
This chart doesn't tell the whole story, and is pretty misleading.
When Netflix started it was getting great content CHEAP. Content owners were just happy to get extra licensing money. Then online streaming exploded, and content owners started asking insane unsupportable fees. Or just refusing to lease, and start their own service. That's why Netflix is becoming a producer.
Not trying to defend anybody. Just pointing out out the danger of only looking at one metric and not the whole picture...
Yeah I agree with this. But then you have all the things thetyve taken away as well (account sharing etc...) and I could make a chart that shows the true price increases as well.
I think, frankly, all you have to do is look at Netflix's ever increasing annual net income for a very similar chart to above. They are price gouging, despite any additional costs they may have
Furthermore, their content library hasn't gotten better. They don't have a lot of the aaa content they used to have. So yeah, people started licensing it for more, and in a lot of cases Netflix said, nah we'll just have a shittier library.