Broadcasting16.02.2023

23 years of DStv price hikes in South Africa

Price increases for DStv Premium remain below inflation, whereas DStv Family subscribers are still paying more for their service in real terms than in 2013, a MyBroadband analysis shows.

Although MultiChoice’s price hikes for DStv Access have generally been above inflation, it only started increasing the package’s price in 2019.

MultiChoice launched DStv Access as “DStv Lite” in 2010 for R99 per month to compete with TopTV at the time.

It introduced DStv Lite the day before TopTV launched in South Africa.

However, TopTV quickly hit financial trouble and went into business rescue in 2012. It was sold to StarTimes and relaunched as StarSat on 31 October 2013.

DStv Lite was rebranded as DStv Access in April 2013, keeping its R99 per month price tag.

Although MultiChoice has imposed above-inflationary increases on DStv Access since 2019, it is still cheaper in real terms when compensating for inflation back to 2010.

It’s a different story for DStv Family, which saw above-inflation increases since MultiChoice launched it in 2013 until around 2021.

Although the 2023 increase is well below inflation, DStv Family is still above its overall inflation benchmark.

MultiChoice announced its price adjustments for 2023 on 14 February, saying they were well below inflation, with an average increase of 4.3% across its DStv satellite pay-TV portfolio.

Streaming-only DStv package prices will not increase this year.

The only above-inflation increase is DStv Access — a 7.5% hike from R120 to R129 per month.

DStv Family will increase from R309 to R319 (3.2%), DStv Compact from R429 to R449 (4.7%), DStv Compact Plus from R549 to R579 (5.5%), and DStv Premium from R839 to R879 (4.8%).

The DStv Access Fee to enable features like Catch Up and decoder video recording will also increase from R110 to R115 (4.5%).

The prices of DStv Premium, DStv Family, and DStv Access against inflation are summarised in the charts below.