ESPN is placing more content exclusively behind the ESPN Unlimited paywall.
On Thursday, ESPN announced its coverage plans for Wimbledon, which begins in four days. Much of the network’s linear coverage remains the same, with ABC, ESPN, and ESPN2 all contributing extensive coverage throughout The Championships. However, many fans might be frustrated to hear that the freedom to select individual matches to watch, rather than rely on the ESPN-curated match coverage on the linear networks, has moved to ESPN Unlimited. In previous years, viewers only needed the more affordable ESPN+ (now ESPN Select) subscription to gain access to every Wimbledon match.
ESPN made a similar decision earlier this year when it moved Australian Open matches behind the ESPN Unlimited paywall.
The decision marks another incremental step by ESPN to encourage viewers to subscribe to ESPN Unlimited, be that through a pay-TV provider or via a direct subscription, which runs $30 per month. By comparison, an ESPN+ subscription is available for just $13 per month.
Luckily, ESPN has slowly but surely rolled out ESPN Unlimited authentication for most major cable, satellite, and virtual pay-TV providers, meaning most users that access ESPN through a linear bundle can access ESPN Unlimited at no additional cost. The major exception is YouTube TV and its over 10 million subscribers, all of whom are still waiting for authentication privileges to ESPN Unlimited. Prior reports suggest access will be given to YouTube TV subscribers before football season.
However, for those operating outside of the pay-TV bundle, the price of watching Wimbledon has more than doubled as compared to last year, when only ESPN+ was necessary to view all matches. Considering the fact that all ESPN+ content is available to users who are able to authenticate into ESPN Unlimited, the decision to move Wimbledon content off of ESPN+ and onto Unlimited is directed entirely at this cohort of viewers.
From a business perspective, this makes sense for ESPN. That particular cohort of viewers are the most likely to see value in an ESPN Unlimited subscription, and perhaps convert into a subscriber. Of course, there are likely some viewers who would’ve been happy to spend $13 for a month of ESPN+ to watch Wimbledon, but won’t want to shell out $30 for the more expensive product. Those viewers are being left in the dust.
About Drew Lerner
Drew Lerner is a staff writer for Awful Announcing and an aspiring cable subscriber. He previously covered sports media for Sports Media Watch. Future beat writer for the Oasis reunion tour.