Twitch announces that subscription prices will be lowered in Germany and other countries. Viewers now have to pay 1 € less for a Level 1 Sub. For streamers, however, it makes a big difference, as Gronkh explains.
The situation in brief:
- On August 5, the streaming service Twitch announced that subscription prices for Level 1 subs will be reduced from the current 4.99 € to 3.99 €.
- The price reduction affects not only Germany but also other regions, and varies in strength in other countries.
- While the price reduction is beneficial for viewers, streamers will receive less money as a result. Some of them may fear for their jobs.
The popular YouTuber and streamer Gronkh has now calculated how hard the cut will hit streamers.
Less money for streamers
What Gronkh says: On Twitter, the German streamer Gronkh commented on Twitch’s announcement. He calculated in a tweet how much losses streamers would suffer from the price change and how many new subs they would need to compensate for those losses.
As there is now a discussion about whether the new prices are good or bad for small or large streamers, I scribbled something here.
— ?????? (@Gronkh) August 5, 2021
How many new subs are needed to restore the status quo?
Assumption is 50% payout. pic.twitter.com/dy0aNBm5dQ
In his calculation, Gronkh assumes a standard 50% payout. This is, therefore, an estimate, which can vary for larger streamers as they receive a higher percentage. One can see in the table that losses increase linearly with the number of subs.
Taking into account that a large portion of subs come from Amazon Prime, revenues will drop even further. Instead of receiving 2.50 € per sub, streamers now only make 2 €. For large streamers like Knossi, Papaplatte, or MontanaBlack, Prime subs account for more than 50% of all their subs, as can be seen on the statistics site TwitchTracker.com.
This is what Twitch is doing: To cushion the losses, Twitch offers a compensation: for the next three months, streamers will receive 100% of the revenue from subs. The streaming service will only waive its part of the sum if the streamers are online for at least 85% of their normal time.
German streamers respond to the price reduction
After the announcement, various German streamers expressed their opinions about it on Twitter. Despite the compensation from Twitch, many streamers do not look forward to the price change. Smaller streamers fear that they will no longer be able to generate enough revenue to remain independent, or that they will have to make up the missing money through other side jobs.
The price difference between different countries is also problematic. On eBay, there are already offers for various levels of Twitch subs, which cost less and are sometimes sold in larger packs of 10. The streamer Inzyania discovered such an offer even before the price change.
If this “business model” turns out to be lucrative, streamers will end up receiving even less money than they already will due to the price reduction.
When will the price reduction take effect? Twitch stated on Twitter that they are currently implementing the price reduction. The changes should be noticeable from this week, according to the statement from the official German Twitch account.
