Why streaming House of the Dragon season 2 just got more expensive

Fans have been waiting nearly two years for House of the Dragon season 2 to premiere, and it is nearly over as the Game of Thrones prequel series is set to return on Sunday, June 16. But the cost to watch House of the Dragon season 2 has just gone up, as the streaming service Max raised its price.

Multiple outlets have reported that as of June 4, the price to sign up for Max's Ad-Free plan has increased $1 from $15.99 per month to $16.99 per month, with an annual subscription cost rising from $149.99 per year to $169.99 per year. For Max's Ultimate Ad-Free plan, which allows for 4K viewing among other perks, is rising from $19.99 per month to $20.99 per month, and $209.99 for a full year. These prices are effective immediately for all new subscribers, while current subscribers will be hit with these new prices with their first billing cycle post July 4.

There is no price change, however, being made to Max's With Ads plan, which remains at $9.99 per month.

Raising the price of Max's ad-free plans ahead of an anticipated series debut is not a new strategy for Max. They also raised their monthly prices $1 ahead of the premiere of The Last of Us in January 2023; again, the price for Max's ad-supported plan was not changed.

Of course, it's not just the premiere of House of Dragon that Max has added in the last year. Live sports have come to Max, with subscribers having enjoyed watching events like March Madness, the NBA playoffs, the NHL playoffs and more on the streaming service at no additional cost. However, that isn't going to be permanent, as Max has made clear the Sports Add-On, which hosts the live sports, is being included only for a limited time; how long that limited time is going to be is still unclear. When that does end, it'll cost subscribers an additional $9.99 per month to continue to watch live sports.

All of this continues to contribute to the fact that Max is one of the pricier streaming services around. Its new $16.99 per month ad-free plan is $5 dollars more than Paramount Plus with Showtime and Peacock, $3 more than Disney Plus and about $1 more than Netflix's standard ad-free plan; it is cheaper than ad-free Hulu though.

Of course, Max is the exclusive streaming home for new HBO content, not only House of the Dragon and The Last of Us, but True Detective and The Regime, as well as its own Max originals, including Hacks, Tokyo Vice and more. In addition, it has older HBO classics, a library of movies from Warner Bros and Turner Classic Movies, reality TV shows from TLC, HGTV and Magnolia, and family-friendly content from Cartoon Network and Looney Tunes.

As for the why of it, an official statement from Warner Bros. Discovery, which owns Max, said "this increase allows us to continue to invest in delivering more culture-defining programming and improving our customer experience for all users."

If the $16.99 or $20.99 per month fee is too rich for you though, but you want to keep Max, then here are a few things you need to know about the $9.99 per month plan with ads. First, you can watch all of the same content with the ad-supported plan as you can with the ad-free plans. Like the $16.99 per month plan, you can also stream Max on two devices simultaneously and watch all content in Full HD. Where things start to differ is that you cannot download any content to watch when you’re not connected to the internet. Also, of course, there are ads. Max says that there are four minutes of ads per hour.

Like or not, if you plan to be streaming House of the Dragon on Max when it comes out, this is the price to do so now.