DStv vs fibre with Netflix and Disney+

MultiChoice recently increased the pricing of its DStv packages, and a MyBroadband analysis reveals that South Africans can get fibre and several streaming services for less each month than the price of DStv Premium.

While streaming services generally charge significantly lower fees, they require uncapped or very high-cap broadband connectivity.

This connectivity can also be used for other purposes, including working and studying from home, and gaming.

Some of the most popular streaming services in South Africa include Netflix, Showmax, Disney+, and Amazon Prime Video.

According to Netflix, a 5Mbps connection is required to stream full HD (1080p) content, while 4K streaming needs up to 25Mbps.

It is important to consider that multiple connections on your network can consume the available bandwidth, leading to buffering when streaming.

Therefore it is often best to get a higher speed connection than your streaming activity will require if you live with others.

To meet the Internet connection requirements for full HD and 4K streaming, we opted for symmetrical 10Mbps and 25Mbps from Zoom Fibre and Octotel, respectively.

These are some of the most affordable symmetrical fibre-to-the-home packages available through Afrihost.

The next thing to consider is streaming limits — or the number of concurrent viewers allowed on a single account.

While we are comparing a single-screen DStv satellite TV package to streaming services, the platforms featured in the comparison allow for multiple concurrent streams.

For instance, both Netflix plans, Amazon Prime Video, Disney+, and Showmax allow multiple concurrent streams.

Like Netflix, Showmax allows up to two simultaneous streams for its Standard subscribers. Amazon Prime Video allows up to three, while Disney+ and Netflix Premium offer the most concurrent streams at four.

To balance this out, we added the cost of DStv’s Access Fee to the total cost of the DStv Premium package.

The Access Fee gives DStv subscribers extra viewing environments, which can be used to connect an additional decoder to the same dish through XtraView. It also provides access to on-demand content like Catch Up and BoxOffice via supported PVR decoders.

Price comparison

MyBroadband compared the price of DStv Premium to that of combining an entry-level fibre package with streaming plans from Netflix, Amazon, and Showmax.

Amazon Prime Video is the cheapest option for full HD and 4K viewers, as the subscription costs only R79 a month.

With Zoom Fibre’s symmetrical 10Mbps package, the Prime Video bundle totals R526 monthly. However, subscribers may be unable to watch the platform’s content in 4K with a 10Mbps connection.

Prime Video with Octotel’s symmetrical 25Mbps package totals R606 — the same price as Netflix Standard with a 10Mbps connection.

Showmax Standard with a 10Mbps fibre connection is the next-most affordable option at R546 a month. Upgrading to Showmax Pro with a 25Mbps connection pushes the monthly price up to R826 a month.

It should be noted that although Showmax’s regular content maxes out at 720p, the streaming platform experimented with 4K broadcasts during the 2022 Fifa World Cup.

Netflix Standard and Netflix Premium are the most expensive streaming platforms compared, with prices of R159 and R199 a month, respectively.

However, even with the top-tier plan and a symmetrical 25Mbps fibre connection, Netflix works out to be more than R200 a month cheaper than DStv Premium with the Access Fee.

Netflix Standard with 10Mbps totals R606 a month, while Netflix Premium with a 25Mbps connection will cost R726 monthly — R268 a month less than DStv Premium and MultiChoice’s Access Fee.

The table below compares the monthly pricing of DStv Premium to Netflix, Prime Video, Disney+, and Showmax with a fibre connection. Fibre prices were obtained from Afrihost’s website.

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