I probably should have put this in the recent survey but the idea came to me after completing it. I saw in the survey Zwift floated the idea of a $25 a month subscription fee. As a infrequent user and with the crap Australian exchange rate that means I would be paying $35AU for a service which I might not use for 3 weeks. Not overly appealing let me say.
As a suggestion, what about the ability to buy blocks of say 100 - 500k? That way infrequent users like myself can still ride when we need to and Zwift will still make money (which they absolutely deserve to). This would provide users with a great deal flexibility and may actually attract a lot users who would not normally fork out for the monthly subscription, so this may prove beneficial to Zwift as well.
The general consensus was that every survey had different pricing ideas. I’m sure they have a good reason for that but when I did my survey, they had it at $10usd which to me would be fair.
I agree with the option for charging by the distance or time on the server. This would be a good deal for the infrequent users and for Zwift. A $25 per month price is way too high for what is being currently offered. That high price would have the effect of greatly reducing the number of users and thus diluting the social aspect of Zwift. If you’re on Zwift with only a few others riding , the experience would be rather boring.
I think one good option would be to partner with Strava and sell a superpremium subscription that would give full access to both.
Agree $25 is too much compared to many other options out there. At the moment even $10 is high for what is available although I suspect that to entice a subscription it will unlock a lot of developments not yet seen.
I’d be cautious of paring it with something else though; strava premium doesn’t fit everyones needs.
Anything higher than $10 per month and it’s a non-starter for me. I really like Zwift a lot but seeing as it does not yet have any training options available it, honestly, isn’t really worth that much per month to me during the “indoor” season. To use my Kickr effectively to train specific intervals I will either go back to using PerfPro, which I already own, or perhaps subscribe to TrainerRoad so I can train effectively and ride on Zwift at the same time. With TR being $10/mo if Zwift was $25/mo that would be WAY out of my monthly training budget. I might be able to do $20 total for TR & Zwift or do training intervals on PerfPro and ride for fun every so often on Zwift at $10/mo.
I would pay $10-12/month, or maybe purchase an annual subscription for up to $150 perhaps (knowing that my use would be less frequent when I can ride outside). But I would not pay more. Zwift is cool, but it ends up being not much different than my Computrainer software for me because I end up riding alone most of the time anyway. I find it much easier to do my structured workouts using Ergvideos.
Why not the other way around? A monthly flat rate with discount for every 100k you ride? That would be a good motivation for me to use it more. And yes I am dutch.
i’m trying to encourage my family to use it. As we only have one trainer I would like to see a family option that would give me the ability to only have one user logged in at any time for the set fee and if we want 2 logged in at any time then you would pay double etc. With current thinking for my family to use Zwift it would cost me $100/month and we only have a single trainer.
I would prefer a family option with say 4 users that can only be on one at a time for $25. A single user for $10 sounds reasonable.
I’m with Peter. I, my wife, and my son use it. At $10 a month, that would be pricey. At $20-$25 a month, that would be cost prohibitive. Perhaps there would be a family option. Hopefully.
I’ve been using Zwift during the winter, being in Canada it’s costing me about $15/month. Weather is getting better now and I can start going outside again, so I’ll probably cancel my subscription. I think it would be a good idea for Zwift to offer a sizeable discount for an annual membership to stop other riders from doing the same. 50-60% off for an annual membership sounds reasonable.
I’m with Neil. Have just hit summer here in Oz and can’t justify keeping Zwift if I may only use a few times a month, if that. There should be an incentive to keep subscriptions active.
As a digital executive, I know projects (products) like Zwift don’t come out easy. It takes months (if not years) to develop and maintaining and improving takes a lot of effort and money as well. So, paying for something that you benefit (and enjoy) is unquestionable. If they can’t make money, they can’t deliver. That simple. So, if you want and enjoy Zwift, then pay up and stop whyning. But, I think there should be other payment options like discounted yearly subscription. That way we can save up some money by committing long term. Cheers.
Alp, it’s not that simple. I’m not opposed to paying for the service, $10/month is not worth it to me for the 8 months a year I don’t need to use it. What Zwift need to do is find the pricing model that generates the most revenue per year. So far they haven’t experimented much. Most people willing to drop $1500 on a smart trainer are probably not the problem. There are a lot more dumb trainers out there who will not pay that much for the service. I personally prefer the free and premium models like most online training tools. Get people hooked on the free and offer good value for the premium.
All I’m saying is that companies like Zwift need support from customers to continue delivering and improving. They need cash flow for developing new courses, new plans, new features, etc. Believe me, with all the paid subscriptions they are probably still ebitda negative. I understand that most people would prefer pay-as-you-go model but that might not be always feasable for the company. If so, they would definitely consider. Cheers.
I totally agree about the revenue. I think and the majority of comments agree that $10/month it too high for casual users. I’d be willing to bet there are a lot more casual users out there. I think Zwift would generate much more revenue at half the price then they do today, and I would like to see them experiment a bit with pricing and promotions, but they haven’t so I guess they’re happy with the subscribers they have.