Normally Plex is one of those platforms that doesn’t draw much attention to itself. People use it to watch movies and shows every day, and most changes are subtle. Something that’s drawing the wrath of the internet, however, is an incoming price spike for the service’s Lifetime Pass, which is rising from $250 to $750. That’s a tremendous sum to pay for any software that isn’t a corporate suite. For some perspective, $750 would get you three years of Adobe’s Creative Cloud photography plan, which includes Photoshop, Lightroom, and 1TB of storage. There are games with Hollywood budgets that sell for a fraction of what Plex is charging.
Nevertheless, I’m planning to keep Plex for the forseeable future, and maybe even ramp up my usage. There’s one big reason, but others are at play, and say something about why Plex has been dominant for so many years.
Why I’m keeping Plex (for now)
And the factors that might sway me later
The main reason I’m sticking around is that I’ve had a Lifetime Pass for several years now. For some of you, I’m sure that invalidates anything else I have to say, but a lot of people are in the same boat. Some customers have paid far less than $250 — for a while, the price was $120, and the earliest adopters (from 2012 to 2014) paid just $75.
If you’ve already bought a Lifetime Pass, there’s no major reason to stop using the platform unless you’re disgusted on behalf of fellow users. The app is still perfectly functional, and it might actually cost more to transition to something else. It’s also understandable (to an extent) why the company would ask for so much money. If you kept using Plex for 10 years, $750 would translate to $75 per year, which is far less than most streaming services charge. Although you’re not getting original TV shows in exchange, you are getting remote access, a library of free licensed titles, and regular feature updates and bugfixes. The latest Call of Duty or Madden game might cost you $80, but there’s no guarantee you’ll get updates for a couple of years, let alone a decade.
Most importantly, it doesn’t seem like the major Plex alternatives are ready for primetime. The leading challenger is Jellyfin, which is free, but also developed entirely by volunteers unless you count third-party client apps like Infuse. It’s not as polished as Plex, and lacks some features, most notably that free content when you want to stretch beyond your personal library. Adding that would automatically demand ads or a pricetag. Another contender is Emby, but that platform follows a business model similar to Plex, mostly just cheaper and without any free content. It might be the way to go if you want options like plugins and a streamlined interface, yet I suspect it could end up looking like Plex down the road, knowing the non-stop push for growth in the tech business.
A point that’s sometimes forgotten is that you don’t need the Lifetime Pass. If your only goal is to watch your media on local devices, Plex is usable for free. It is true that useful items are gated behind a Plex Pass, most notably the ability to cache videos directly to phones and tablets. But they’re not always essential, and if you do need them, there are monthly and annual rates available. You might, for example, stick to the free option most of the time, but step up to Plex Pass for a month when you’re about to head out on vacation.
You may not even need that, since there’s a Remote Watch Pass that’s cheaper still. It does feel a bit stingy to charge for access to your own home server — but there are backend considerations, and you can share your server with friends and family.
Will I ever jump ship? Possibly. While I like the idea of squeezing the most out of a Lifeftime Pass, I’ve had one for a long time, and there are elements of Plex I dislike beyond rising fees. For one thing, that push for profit means that ad-supported features can get in the way of my own videos. I can deal with software that’s rough around the edges if the result is equal or greater convenience. Time will tell if something like Jellyfin can go toe-to-toe.
