Crunchyroll is one of the most popular streaming platforms for anime viewers. Over the past six years, the service has raised prices for fans, and today, it announced it is increasing monthly subscription prices by up to 20 percent.
Sony purchased Crunchyroll from AT&T in 2020. At the time, Crunchyroll had 3 million paid subscribers and an additional 197 million users with free accounts, which let people watch a limited number of titles with ads. At the time, Crunchyroll monthly subscription tiers were priced at $8, $10, or $15.
Following its acquisition by Sony, like many large technology companies that buy smaller, beloved products, the company made controversial changes. The Tokyo-based company replaced rival Funimation as Crunchyroll; Sony shut down Funimation, which it purchased in 2017, in April 2024.
In the process, Sony wiped out people’s digital Funimation library, which Funimation originally marketed as “available forever”, but with some restrictions. Sony also reduced the number of free titles on Crunchyroll in 2022 before eliminating the free option entirely on December 31, 2025.
Crunchyroll gets more expensive
Today, Crunchyroll raised the prices for its remaining tiers. The cheapest plan, Fan, went from $8 per month to $10 per month. The Mega tier, which allows streaming from four devices simultaneously, went from $12 to $14. The Ultra tier, which supports simultaneous streaming on six devices and includes access to the Crunchyroll Manga app, has increased from $16 to $18.
Existing customers will see the changes after March 4. Crunchyroll is charging higher prices to new customers right away.
Crunchyroll last raised prices in May 2024, when its Mega tier went from $10 to $12 and its Ultimate tier went from $15 to $16. The last increase in the price of the fan tier was in 2019.
Crunchyroll said that the higher prices would “give fans more things to like.” Today’s announcement pointed to “recent and upcoming” changes to: teen profile and PIN protection; Multiple profiles; Ability to skip intro theme songs and end credits; and “Extended Device Compatibility.”
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