Multiple sources (e.g., https://www.youtube.com/post/Ugkxa_Jy7H_ixQY9LgLg3WUeQxxFEDzqdD8E) report that the cost of a lifetime Plex Pass subscription is increasing from its current US$249 to US$749, effective 1 July 2026. I’m glad I got mine for $75 back in 2014, but if you’re planning on doing this, sooner is better than later.
But it’s looking increasing like (1) Plex want people to not use Plex (because they can’t not know there are alternatives), and (2) Plex really isn’t interested in being a personal media server any more. On the latter point, they seem to think people want yet another streaming service.
Might be time to dust off my Jellyfin installation…
Not a huge surprise from my side. They are trying to move folks away from one-time fixed purchase price towards the ARR model, which is what businesses generally prefer. That and putting some distance between themselves and the stand-alone media server which earned them a reputation as an enabler of streaming pirated content. I’m sure this also plays a factor with their investors and public relations types
I don’t suppose I’ll ever know, but I really wonder about the relative proportions of users who use Plex primarily as a standalone media server vs. those who use it primarily as a streaming service. I always assume I’m “normal”,[1] so I’d expect that most Plex users use it as I do, which is as a standalone media server. If that is the case, all the streaming stuff is just going to annoy their users–and the few times I’ve visited their forum, there have seemed to be a number of active threads to that effect.
And maybe it’s because I haven’t looked very closely at it, but I don’t see what the streaming side of Plex provides that users can’t get in a dozen other places. The “home media server” space is pretty small; Plex are a big fish in a small pond there. But there are dozens of streaming services–if I want that, why not just go to Netflix? Or Hulu? Or AppleTV+? Or whatever else? But maybe that is what most of their subscribers do.
But regardless of reason, two price hikes in just over a year, resulting in a 6x price increase, are going to generate a lot of ill will.
Does this affect users who only watch local media and home videos?
I’ve never bothered with creating a Plex account ever since moving to Jellyfin. Is it only required for online streaming or is it needed even to watch your own videos on your local network?
I haven’t tried, but I’d expect Tailscale would circumvent this. But there is also a “remote watch pass” subscription that enables only this, and only for you, without any of the other plex pass features.
The irony is that if this change pushes me away from using Plex, that probably benefits them–I doubt my subscription is costing them much, but it’s something; if I’m not using it, I’d expect that to reduce their costs, even if only marginally.
There’s a parallel to be drawn regarding requiring a subscription to use features of your own hardware, but I’m not going to make it.
But if their annual pricing isn’t changing–and it seems it isn’t–this really does look like they’re just trying to kill off the lifetime subscription. Plex Pass is currently $69.99/yr, so it takes 11 years for a lifetime sub to break even (vs. 3.5 years at today’s pricing). And the breakeven point has been at 3-4 years for a very long time. Paying ahead for 3-4 years (to get a lifetime sub) for something I expect to use a lot is an easy choice, but 11 years? How do I know the company will even be in business that long?
That’s coming next.
Move #1: Don’t like recurring subscriptions? We have a lifetime license for you. (See like we are good guys?)
Move #2: Due to lack of interest, the lifetime license was discontinued. (Not out fault, we’re stil good guys, right?)
We’ve considered eliminating the Lifetime Plex Pass in the past, given that recurring subscriptions help us sustain long-term development, but we know it’s still a valuable option for many in our community. So instead of retiring it, we’re keeping it available at a price that reflects the real, ongoing value of the software we’re committed to building and maintaining for years to come.
Plex also has reason to put more focus on its streaming business since more people have been using Plex’s online streaming service than its media server capabilities since 2022, Scott Hancock, Plex’s then-VP of marketing, said in 2023.
…though I still suspect it’s at least partially a self-fulfilling prophecy.
So instead of retiring it, we’re keeping it available at a price that reflects the real, ongoing value of the software we’re committed to building and maintaining for years to comeclearly and deliberately discourages anyone from actually using it.
The only real downside to Jellyfin is that it has no way to manage remote access. I share my Plex library with a few family members, and sharing Jellyfin (and only Jellyfin) with them would be kind of tricky. Less of an issue (though still an issue) is lack of first-party apps for mobile, Apple TV, etc.
But Plex are almost as adept as Netgate in giving people reasons to leave them.
Another option for remote access is to simply buy your own domain and get the setup going that way. A domain is actually pretty cheap at about $10 a year.
Sure, the domain is cheap (or can even be free). Remote access is pretty easy–just port-forward. But if you want that remote access to be secure, well…
Tailscale is an almost trivially easy way to have secure remote access to resources on your LAN, if you’re the only one who needs it. If you want to give other family members access to some things, but not others, it gets more complicated.
