MW Who will pay for ESPN's new $29.99 streaming service?

By Weston Blasi

The streaming service from 'the worldwide leader in sports' is launching this fall - but do most sports fans actually need it?

After years of speculation, the Walt Disney Co. $(DIS)$ is finally launching a direct-to-consumer app this fall that will deliver its ESPN channel for $29.99 a month (or $299 a year).

Prior to this announcement, the ESPN channel was only available via cable and over-the-top services like YouTubeTV or Sling.

But who is supposed to be the target audience for this standalone service?

Casual sports fans looking to stream a few big events like March Madness or the Super Bowl can already pay $996 a year for YouTubeTV $(GOOGL)$ $(GOOG)$, which bundles together all the major networks that carry most major sporting events for the year - including ESPN.

More serious sports fanatics, in comparison, could be spending a minimum $1,254 a year across several services including Amazon Prime $(AMZN)$, Netflix $(NFLX)$, Paramount+ $(PARA)$, HBO Max $(WBD)$, Peacock $(CMCSA)$, NFL Sunday Ticket and the new ESPN service, plus the cost of Fox Corp.'s $(FOXA)$ upcoming service Fox One.

So the bottom line is, ESPN's unbundled streaming service seems to be designed for a niche audience of sports fans who are currently not paying for ESPN's sports elsewhere, analysts say.

"ESPN has such a strong foothold in linear TV, and they have for decades," Daniel Kirschner, chief executive of Greenfly, a software company used by major sports leagues for content initiatives, told MarketWatch. "While this will reach certain groups of cord-cutters, there's a growing subset of sports fans who never paid for cable in the first place - viewers who have always relied on streaming to consume sports content. This gives ESPN an opportunity to capture that audience."

That group of consumers - ones who would be willing to shell out $299 a year for sports programming and who are not already subscribed to other streaming services, or have a subscription like YouTubeTV - is a niche audience, several industry analysts told MarketWatch.

The new ESPN streaming service won't feature content that's not already on ESPN. And for this reason, ESPN is hoping that people who have cable or YouTubeTV will stick with those services, since it makes money from those subscriber fees, too. Instead, it's pitching this new platform to consumers who are sports fans who are missing out on the games appearing on ESPN.

"While it may not offer exclusive games out of the gate, it's an important step toward future-proofing ESPN's relationship with its audience, and reinforces the growing importance of platform control in the current sports media landscape," Kirschner said.

There will be more bundling between Disney's other streaming platforms Disney+ and Hulu, the company said in a release, but it didn't provide pricing information on that yet. A bundle that includes ESPN, Hulu and Disney+ will be available for $35.99 a month with ads, and $44.99 without.

That's not to be confused with ESPN+ - a separate subscription that features some original content and access to some written stories on ESPN.com. ESPN+, which includes some exclusive programming like golf majors and Spanish soccer, is not going away and will be partially integrated into ESPN's new app.

ESPN's announcement prompted several sports fans to debate the merits of yet another streaming service joining the sports space, not to mention the $29.99 starting price.

"I might pay $30 for a package that included Fox Sports and whatever other channels carry college football, but just ESPN? No thanks," one Reddit user posted.

Others see it as a good deal. "$30 a month during NFL/CFB season is a hell of a lot better than $70+ for cable," another user posted.

"Someone should just get all of these TV networks and bundle them all together as a one-time payment per month," another Reddit user mused - alluding to the cable-service model that cord-cutters have been leaving behind. "They could give you a box with a little cable that you just attach to your TV and get everything. It'd be much simpler."

The new ESPN streaming service may not launch with exclusive games and events, which typically are a major driver of subscriptions, but it could have one other form of programming that may bring in subscriptions.

The massively popular NFL RedZone channel - a show that broadcasts several football games at the same time on Sundays during football season, showing big plays and touchdowns - could be one such program to keep an eye on.

Andrew Marchand of the Athletic reported that ESPN has explored a deal to acquire NFL Media, which includes NFL RedZone among other assets, although talks are still ongoing.

"From a programming standpoint, I can also see ESPN+ repackage content and create their own version of a NFL RedZone with the leagues, plus develop specific TV experiences that have never been broadcasted, such as enhanced sports-betting features and an e-commerce component," Bob Mitchell, founder of Mitchell Partnership Alliances and an adjunct professor at American University's Kogod School of Business, told MarketWatch. "The overall value proposition has to be very clear."

Several experts reiterated not to focus too much on the $29.99 price tag because of the bundling that ESPN's app will likely divvy out.

Some have wondered if yet another fracturing of the streaming landscape - particularly in the sports world - could truly mean the end of cable. But the dirty secret of sports streaming is that you don't actually need 10 services to get the vast majority of sporting events in your living room; you just need one.

"The Disney bundle now becomes incredibly attractive," Kirschner said.

-Weston Blasi

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May 15, 2025 13:17 ET (17:17 GMT)

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