$30 a month for Ultimate — I don’t think Game Pass is worth it anymore

Microsoft finally pulled the trigger. As of today, Xbox Game Pass has undergone another makeover with a price increase. Some of these changes, at least for the lower tiers, appear to be consumer-friendly reshuffles, but the headline story is that Game Pass Ultimate has just increased by nearly 50% in price. And in a climate where streaming subscription fatigue is at an all-time high, that’s a hard pill to swallow. For the first time, I'm questioning if Xbox Game Pass is still worth it for me.

Essential and Premium getting the better end of deal

At first glance, the “cheap seats” look surprisingly generous. Game Pass Essential ($9.99/month), previously known as Game Pass Core, previously known as Xbox Live Gold (keep up with me here), has been beefed up significantly. Now you get access to Xbox, PC, and the Cloud, over 50 curated games, access to Xbox Cloud Gaming, and in-game benefits for some games.

Game Pass Premium ($14.99/month lands at the same price as the old Standard plan, you get everything you do with Essential, with the addition of those Xbox Game Studio games added up to a year after launch (but not Call of Duty). We have a comprehensive breakdown of everything that's included in the Xbox Game Pass changes here.

In addition to the above, PC Game Pass, which was previously the sleeper hit bargain at $11.99, has been hiked to $16.49. For the sake of having Ubisoft+ classics access added in. The cynic in me thinks this has been done because of the impending launch of the Xbox ROG Ally X, which, no matter how much Microsoft wants to tell us is an Xbox, it isn't, it's a handheld PC, and many will likely purchase the PC Game Pass only subscription because of this. So better hike those prices fast!

I know this because I have pre-ordered the Xbox Ally X myself and was already considering a cheaper move to PC Game Pass if this were to become my primary gaming unit.

Unfortunately, I can't really be happy about any of the lower-tier improvements (not counting the hike on PC Game Pass) because the cost is being paid somewhere, by someone, and that's going to be those of us on Xbox Game Pass Ultimate.

The price to be paid by Game Pass Ultimate subscribers

Here's where things get painful. Game Pass Ultimate, which previously cost $19.99 a month in the U.S, is bumping up to $29.99. Lest we forget, they already bumped the price from $16.99 to $19.99 back in September last year.

So that is a 50% increase. Xbox Game Pass Ultimate bundles everything: console, PC, day-one releases, Call of Duty, Ubisoft+, EA Play, Fortnite Crew, and cloud gaming with 1440p resolution and boosted bitrate. For those that care, and I do not. My colleague Samuel Tolbert made a good point that there are plenty of casual players that will appreciate it, but at the cost of the hardcore audience?

And while Microsoft frames it as paying for “flexibility” and “value,” the reality is much simpler. This is the Call of Duty tax. Premium subscribers don’t get COD. PC subscribers do. And Ultimate subscribers must, because Microsoft isn’t leaving a cent of that audience on the table. They are telling us this comes with a guarantee of 75+ day one game launches per year, which on the face of it sounds great, but — who has time to play and enjoy all of those games? If I were unemployed, maybe, but then I wouldn't be able to afford the Ultimate tier. Who is asking for this?

Are tariffs and inflation solely to blame?

The official story is that tariffs, inflation, and the costs of cloud servers are forcing Microsoft’s hand. But let’s not pretend this is about survival. Just a few months ago, Xbox President Sarah Bond was shouting from the rooftops about how Game Pass was not just sustainable but profitable, generating a staggering $5 billion in revenue last year.

So, forgive me if I don’t buy the line that Microsoft is raising prices because they have no choice. $5 billion wasn’t enough? Apparently not. Because Satya Nadella needs to feed the beast after greenlighting that $69 billion Activision Blizzard acquisition. You don’t spend that much and then shrug when the bill comes due. Someone has to foot the tab. It’s you, me, and anyone else who wants to squad up in Call of Duty without forking over $79.99 up front. Remember, game prices went up this year, too?

Microsoft Rewards being given on one hand and taken with the other

It's not the only bad news we've had from the Xbox camp this week, with the bombshell change to Microsoft Rewards. Earning free months of Game Pass through Rewards was always a clever “loyalty loop” for hardcore players, but you can no longer exchange points for Xbox Game Pass directly.

Of course, you can still trade in for Xbox store credit and use it towards subscriptions, but the value conversion rate is significantly lower when doing so, and Xbox is aware of this. The new Game Pass changes promise more opportunities to earn reward points from playing your games, but it remains to be seen how much this will actually benefit the playbase when this sneaky devaluation has been done in the background. It's just the latest in a line of ways to erode value in Microsoft Rewards that has been in steady decline over the past few years.

The value paradox

So where does that leave us? On paper, Xbox Game Pass is still the best deal in gaming. You’re drowning in value across all four tiers, with more bundled services than most players can realistically use. But the psychology here matters.

When a subscription crosses into “ouch” territory, people start doing the math. And for Ultimate at $29.99, that math gets uncomfortable fast; it certainly has for me, as I can't see the value in the increase for me personally. Here’s where my personal experience with Game Pass starts to collide with Microsoft’s pricing strategy.

Imagine going to buy a car for £10,000. That’s your budget. You find the exact model you want. Then the dealer says: “We don’t stock that one anymore, but we do have this £15,000 version, and it comes with heated seats!”

I don’t want warm buttocks. I want the car I had, at the price I had. That’s exactly how Ultimate feels to me now. Microsoft is charging $29.99 a month for perks that I frankly don’t care about: Fortnite Crew, Ubisoft+ Classics, and “boosted cloud streaming.” Sure, they’re nice, but they’re not the reasons I signed up for Game Pass. The “heated seats” are irrelevant if I didn’t need them in the first place.

The games that truly defined my 2025 Game Pass experience weren’t the AAA blockbusters. They were smaller, lower-priced gems. Clair Obscur and Blue Prince. Clair Obscur launched around $49.99 at retail, and Blue Prince at $30. These are the games I played obsessively, the ones I loved. Meanwhile, the AAA juggernauts like Call of Duty just didn't hold my attention.

So when Microsoft suddenly ups the price of Ultimate by 50% to subsidize all these extras I don’t want, the math stops adding up for me. I’m paying for a buffet of content where I only eat one or two items. Game Pass is still objectively loaded with content, but the content I actually value isn’t aligned with the new cost.

Phil Spencer notoriously said Game Pass isn't for everyone, and I'm not sure it will be for me anymore when my subscription ends (thankfully, I am paid up to September 2026).

Yes, Game Pass is still “worth it” compared to buying every major release outright. But it’s no longer the "too good to be true" deal that made Xbox the scrappy underdog of the console wars. Now it feels corporate and very much like a trillion-dollar company squeezing its most loyal fans because it can.

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