Getty/Steve Jennings
Twitch CEO Emmett Shear
- Amazon's incredibly popular Prime service is losing a major benefit: Ad-free Twitch viewing.
- Going forward, Twitch viewers who want an ad-free experience have to pay for Twitch Turbo.
- Twitch explained the change in a blog post on Monday, which said that the video streaming company, "re-evaluated some of the existing Twitch Prime benefits."
- Many Twitch users are furious with the change.
Amazon's Prime service offers loads of benefits: Free shipping on a ton of Amazon products, a library of streaming entertainment, and even discounts at Amazon-owned Whole Foods.
And, up until this week, if you were an Amazon Prime subscriber you could also enjoy an ad-free viewing experience on the video streaming service Twitch, which is owned by Amazon. But on Monday, Twitch announced a major upcoming change to its Twitch Prime service that would no longer make that the case:
"As we have continued to add value to Twitch Prime, we have also re-evaluated some of the existing Twitch Prime benefits. As a result, universal ad-free viewing will no longer be part of Twitch Prime for new members, starting on September 14."
Put more simply, even Twitch Prime paying subscribers will see ads on Twitch streams.
The only way to remove ads from the Twitch experience now is to pay even more for Twitch Turbo, a separate subscription service for Twitch which costs $9/month.
Amazon/Twitch
It's a move that Twitch fans are furious about.
"I'm just floored at Amazon's greed here. I'm considering ditching Prime altogether," one Reddit user wrote on the Twitch subreddit. "I'd honestly prefer to have ad-free viewing instead of the free games," another user wrote.
As the latter post alludes to, Twitch Prime began offering free games and in-game content to subscribers recently. Much of the time, these free games and/or in-game content are less than thrilling - loot box partnerships that Amazon strikes with game makers like Blizzard Entertainment for "Overwatch," for example.
Getting free loot boxes for "Overwatch" is nice, but it's not a strong argument for paying for Twitch Prime.
More importantly, Sony and Microsoft offer excellent free games through PlayStation Plus and Xbox Live Gold every month. By comparison, the offerings through Twitch Prime are paltry at best. It's these free offerings that are being cited as a replacement for ad-free Twitch viewing.
"On top of everything you get through Amazon Prime, this year alone we've offered members more than $1,000 worth of games and loot," Twitch said in a blog post. But for many, the main reason to subscribe to Twitch Prime was for the ad-free experience.
As one user succinctly put it: "I probably claim less than 25% of the free stuff they offer with Prime. Ad-free viewing is the only perk besides the monthly free sub that I care about. Big yikes from me for this change."