How big was Game Pass before the hike?
Microsoft hasn’t shared an up-to-date public subscriber count. The last confirmed figure came in February 2024, when Xbox Game Pass had 34 million subscribers.
By mid-2025, the service was believed to have passed 35 million subscribers, though that number was never officially confirmed by Microsoft. That matters because without a reliable starting point, it is difficult to measure the scale of the decline Ball referenced.
What is clear is that Game Pass was no longer growing with the same easy momentum it once had. The service built its reputation as one of gaming’s better values, offering a large catalog and major new releases for a relatively modest monthly cost. That value pitch becomes much harder to sell when the price keeps climbing and the biggest releases arrive less predictably.
What changed with the 2025 Game Pass pricing
In October 2025, Xbox raised the price of Game Pass Ultimate by 50 percent. At the same time, it reworked its cheaper Game Pass tiers, changing the structure of the service for players who did not want to pay for the most expensive option.
The move came a little over a year after another price increase in 2024, so subscribers had already been asked to absorb a higher bill fairly recently. For families, casual players, and people who only dip into a few games a year, the math likely became less charming.
The fallout also helps explain what happened next. In April 2026, new Xbox CEO Asha Sharma lowered the price, although not all the way back to 2025 levels. That adjustment came with another major shift: future Call of Duty games would no longer launch directly into the service.
Why the loss matters for Xbox
For years, Xbox Game Pass was treated as the cleanest argument for owning an Xbox. It offered access, convenience, and a sense that subscribers were getting more than they paid for. That combination made it feel less like a subscription trap and more like a sensible gaming budget.
But the service has been losing some of that shine. Price increases have made it less obviously cheap, while the stream of must-play additions has not always matched the expectations Xbox created during Game Pass’s strongest period.
To be clear, Game Pass still adds solid new games every month, and it remains a significant part of Microsoft’s gaming strategy. The question is not whether the service has value. It is whether enough players still feel that value is obvious at the current price.
Ball’s comment suggests a large number of subscribers decided it was not. For Xbox, that is more than a pricing problem. It is a reminder that subscription loyalty can look very sturdy right up until the monthly bill changes.
