Xbox Live Gold is getting a big price hike

In what feels like an attempt at kicking some bad news under the rug on a Friday, Microsoft announced this morning that the price of Xbox Live Gold is going up.

Here's how the price changes break down:

• The one-month plan is going from $10 per month to $11.
• The three-month plan is going from $25 to $30.
• The six-month plan is going from $40 to $60 - but only for new customers, says Microsoft.

But what about the twelve-month plan? Didn't they used to offer those?"

They did! It was $60 - or the price that a six-month subscription will go for now. They stopped selling twelve-month plans back in July of last year, presumably because this change was on the horizon and they would've had to acknowledge on the price tag that 12 months of Live Gold would cost $120.

The good news: the price hike on the six-month plan only impacts new customers. If you've already got a six-month subscription (or are grandfathered into an auto-renewing twelve-month subscription), Xbox Support confirmed in a tweet that the price won't increase:

If you're an existing online 12-month or 6-month Xbox Live Gold member, there's no price change. If you choose to renew your membership, it will renew at your current price.https://t.co/wFJmElI5dH

- Xbox Support (@XboxSupport) January 22, 2021

If you're on the one-month or three-month plans, though, it sounds like you'll be paying the new price.

So why bump the cost? Microsoft doesn't officially outline their reasoning (beyond pointing out that they haven't increased the price in years, or as long as a decade in some regions), but one can assume it's at least partially to make the $15 a month Xbox Game Pass (which bundles Xbox Live Gold with a library of all-you-can-eat, on-demand titles) that much more alluring.