This week Sky announced another update, confirming that from March it will begin rolling out a new bundle of streaming apps linked to your Sky subscription at no additional cost. A link to the news is below, but here are my thoughts on what it really means.
There’s definitely a lot of hype and some genuine positives, but it also feels like Sky is quietly correcting its course. We’ve already seen the return of Sky One, and now the introduction of an app bundle that, in many ways, restores access to content that once sat within the core Sky subscription before everything drifted off to individual streaming platforms.
Disney is probably the best example. Once upon a time, much of that content lived within Sky’s ecosystem. Then it disappeared behind the Disney+ paywall and suddenly required a separate subscription. Yes, it’s great that access is now being restored into the standard Sky package via the app, but it’s hard not to feel this is something that should always have been the case rather than something being presented as a brand new benefit. Still, as a Disney subscriber, this should save me £5.99 a month.
Is the multi-app bundle really new though? In my opinion, not entirely. It feels more like an expansion of something that already existed. Sky subscribers have previously had Netflix included, Discovery+ was bundled in, and Paramount+ arrived as part of Sky Cinema. What we’re really seeing now is the addition of Disney+ and Hayu to a structure that was already in place, just positioned as a major relaunch.
While I will save money by no longer paying for a Disney subscription, Hayu is not an app I would ever have thought of signing up to. I will have to judge it once I have access, but I understand it specialises in reality TV, which may appeal to some more than others.
HBO Max is where things get a bit more complicated. I’m not convinced this will be an entirely positive change for Sky subscribers, particularly for those who pay extra for ad skipping. If more content shifts to external apps rather than Sky’s own platform, that feature could become less valuable. We will have to wait and see.
And that leads to a bigger concern. Does this signal the slow diminishing of Sky’s own platform features? Ad skipping has been one of the key selling points of the Sky Stream experience. If more viewing happens through third-party apps, it becomes less useful if those apps include ads unless you pay extra. Similarly, does the Ultra TV (4K) upgrade start to feel a bit less essential unless you are mainly using it for Sport and Cinema? Paying for Ultra 4K for general entertainment may not offer much real value if 4K ends up sitting behind app upgrades instead.
There are also questions around Paramount+, and I do wonder if any other changes are afoot. I wouldn’t be surprised if that one quietly disappears at some point.
Of course, there are obvious positives. Many people will save money if they no longer need to pay separately for some of the apps they want, and the idea of having everything accessible under one subscription is appealing. But it’s hard not to be a little sceptical about how long that saving will last. Historically, Sky price increases tend to follow sooner rather than later.
In truth, this change feels partly driven by Sky being slow to react in recent years to how quickly the TV landscape shifted. The company that once disrupted the TV market now feels like it’s playing catch-up, adapting to a world where the power sits with streaming services and content owners rather than traditional platforms. Sky is perhaps repositioning itself slightly.
This isn’t a bad move. In fact, it’s probably a necessary one. But it feels less like the start of a new era and more like a recalibration back towards what Sky used to do best, just packaged in a more modern way.
Let’s hope Sky learns from this and starts leading the way again.
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