Game Pass Price Change
- Xbox cut Game Pass Ultimate to $22.99 per month from $29.99. (x.com) - Microsoft also said new Call of Duty titles will no longer hit Game Pass day-one, arriving on the service more than a year after release. (x.com) - The simultaneous price drop and day-one delay has triggered debate about value versus launch exclusivity. (x.com) (x.com)
Microsoft cut Xbox Game Pass Ultimate to $22.99 a month on April 21, but future Call of Duty games will no longer arrive on the service at launch. (news.xbox.com) The new monthly price is down from $29.99, and PC Game Pass also fell to $13.99 from $16.49. Microsoft said the changes took effect immediately, with regional pricing varying outside the United States. (news.xbox.com) Microsoft said new Call of Duty releases will be added to Game Pass Ultimate and PC Game Pass in “the following holiday season,” about a year after launch. Games already in the library will stay there, and Microsoft said other major day-one releases will continue. (news.xbox.com) That is a sharp reversal from October 1, 2025, when Xbox rebuilt Game Pass into Essential, Premium and Ultimate tiers and said Ultimate subscribers would get “over 75 day one releases a year,” including Call of Duty: Black Ops 7. (news.xbox.com) Xbox’s current store page now advertises day-one games on Ultimate with an asterisk that says Call of Duty titles are excluded. The same page lists Premium at $14.99 a month and says that tier gets “select new games within 1 yr.” (xbox.com) Microsoft said the change followed player feedback and that there is no single subscription model that fits every customer. IGN reported the move came days after new Microsoft Gaming chief Asha Sharma told employees Game Pass had become too expensive for players. (news.xbox.com) (ign.com) The Call of Duty shift lands three years after Microsoft closed its $68.7 billion Activision Blizzard deal in October 2023, a takeover that put one of gaming’s biggest annual franchises under Xbox control. Video Games Chronicle said the new policy undercuts the idea that Microsoft would use Call of Duty as a permanent day-one subscription draw. (theverge.com) (videogameschronicle.com) For subscribers, the trade is simple: Ultimate now costs $7 less each month, but the biggest shooter in Xbox’s portfolio moves off the launch-day list. Microsoft is still selling Game Pass on hundreds of games, cloud streaming, online console multiplayer and first-day access to other releases. (news.xbox.com) (xbox.com)
