Xbox increased the price of its Game Pass Ultimate subscription by 50% in October 2025, raising the monthly fee from $19.99 to $29.99. This led to the service losing millions of subscribers over the following months, according to Matthew Ball, who said, "We shed millions of subscribers over the span of a few months" [1].
As of February 2024, Xbox had at least 34 million Game Pass subscribers, showing the scale of users affected by the price hike [1, 2, 3]. The October 2025 increase followed an earlier price rise in 2024. [4]
In response to the subscriber losses, Xbox CEO Asha Sharma admitted the higher price was too steep and reduced the monthly fee to $22.99 in April 2026, still above the pre-hike amount but seen as more acceptable. Sharma said, "We have seen [Game Pass] acquisitions grow and retention improve. It's a good first step" [5]. Matthew Ball noted the price cut "is resonating with gamers" [6].
Following the April 2026 price reduction, Xbox reported growth in new Game Pass subscriptions and improved retention as of May 2026 [5, 6, 7, 3].
Xbox also announced a renewed focus on exclusive games in June 2026, planning some titles to be Xbox console exclusives and reconsidering previous multi-platform release plans. Ball emphasized the importance of exclusives, stating, "Players can expect a reliable pipeline that validates their historical investment in the Xbox platform, keeps them as Xbox players going forward. And everyone in the industry understands that exclusives are important to the growth and branding of that platform" [1].
Additionally, future Call of Duty releases will no longer launch on Game Pass at release but will be added about one year later [1, 2, 8, 6, 7, 3].
The next major update from Xbox is expected in the coming months as they roll out these changes and track subscriber numbers after the 2026 price adjustment.
