Overview
- Microsoft announced Friday that, beginning in November, Xbox Game Pass cloud streaming will switch from unlimited play to fixed monthly hour allowances for subscribers.
- The new monthly allotments are 15 hours for Ultimate (€21), 10 hours for Premium (€13), and 5 hours for Essential (€9).
- After a user exhausts their monthly hours they can buy additional streaming time in the Xbox Store and non-subscribers will also be able to purchase hours.
- Microsoft has not disclosed prices for add-on hours, which games will be eligible to stream, or how the caps will apply to PC Game Pass, and it estimates about four percent of subscribers will be affected.
- The change continues a year of Game Pass shifts and signals a move toward a subscription-plus-pay-as-you-go model that could reshape access for casual, mobile, and console-less players.