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Xbox’s chief strategy officer Matthew Ball has confirmed that Xbox Game Pass lost “millions” of subscribers after the massive price hike for the service in 2025.
Speaking at The Game Business Live today, Ball said, “We shed millions of subscribers over the span of a few months” following the hike from $20 to $30 that was announced in October 2025.
Ball went on to say that Microsoft “corrected that offering” by lowering the price down to $23/month for Game Pass Ultimate as one of Xbox CEO Asha Sharma’s first big moves. He also called out Microsoft’s decision to stop releasing new Call of Duty games into the Game Pass library as an effort that resonated with users.
At $23/month, Game Pass Ultimate is still more expensive than it was this time last year, Ball pointed out, but “the value has changed.”
Microsoft does not disclose Game Pass subscriber numbers, so we don’t know how many people it had, then lost, then potentially regained since the price cut was announced in April 2026.
In 2024, Microsoft announced that Game Pass had 34 million members–that number included Xbox Live Gold accounts that were converted to Game Pass Core. This tier is now called Game Pass Essential.
Also during Ball’s talk, he discussed how Xbox–as a brand and a business-languished under the leadership of Phil Spencer and Sarah Bond. Sharma has pledged to “reset” the Xbox business going forward and revitalize the brand, and part of that effort is a push toward exclusive games. But Microsoft’s messaging about Xbox exclusives has been messy, prompting many longtime fans to say it’s actually more of the same from the Spencer/Bond days.
At the Xbox Games Showcase, Microsoft announced that Gears of War: E-Day (October 2026) would be a console exclusive on Xbox and that Clockwork Revolution (2027) would be a console exclusive on Xbox as well. Beyond those, Ball has promised a “reliable pipeline” of console exclusives in the future.
Beyond exclusive games, Microsoft remains focused on hardware and, despite rising component costs, the company is going ahead with its plan for a next-generation console in Project Helix.
