Roku Rolls Out 30+ Streaming Bundles, Here's What They Actually Cost You
Roku is bundling niche and premium streaming apps into single monthly bills, and the savings depend entirely on which ones you'd actually watch.
Roku is betting that you’re tired of juggling a dozen separate app subscriptions. On Thursday, the company rolled out more than 30 new bundle deals through The Roku Channel, pairing streaming services together at a single discounted monthly price, the same basic idea Amazon has used with Prime Video add-on channels for years.
What’s actually in the bundles
The lineup ranges from big names to services most people have never heard of. HBO Max and Cinemax together run $23 a month ($276 a year). Fox One paired with Fox Nation costs $25 a month ($300 a year). Starz shows up in six different combinations, with AMC Plus ($16/month), BritBox ($18/month), MGM Plus ($14/month), Acorn TV ($16/month), Crunchyroll ($17/month) and Hallmark Plus ($15/month).
At the other end, there’s a long tail of cheaper, more obscure pairings: Howdy and A&E Crime Central for $7 a month, Curiosity Stream and Get.factual for $5.50, or Shout! TV paired with either Midnight Pulp or Screambox for $6. Roku’s own service, Howdy, gets exclusive bundle treatment with several partners, including Hallmark Plus.
Do the bundles actually save money?
That depends entirely on what you’d pay for each service on its own, and Roku hasn’t published those standalone prices alongside the bundle rates, so the discount isn’t obvious at a glance. The math only works in your favor if you were already planning to subscribe to both services in a pairing. If you only wanted one of the two, the bundle can end up costing more than going solo, since you’re paying for an app you won’t use.
The appeal is real for anyone who already has a wandering eye across niche genre services, horror, British TV, Christian family programming, anime, where standalone subscriptions to smaller platforms often carry a per-app markup relative to their limited catalogs. Bundling two of those into one line item, and one monthly charge, is a genuine convenience even if the total dollar savings are modest.
Why Roku is doing this now
The bundles aren’t charity. Roku’s subscription business, which takes a cut of sign-ups through its platform, posted its best-ever quarter for premium subscription sign-ups in Q1, with subscription revenue up 30 percent year-over-year to $518.5 million. More bundles mean more transactions running through Roku’s channel, and more recurring revenue for the company, whether or not a given bundle saves you money.
What to do about it
Before adding any bundle, check whether you’d actually watch both services regularly, a discount on something you won’t use is still money spent. Compare the bundle price against what each app charges as a standalone subscription in your Roku account or on the provider’s own site; Roku doesn’t list that comparison for you. If you’re already paying for one half of a pairing separately, switching to the bundled rate could lower your bill, but only if the second app has real value to you. And as with any streaming subscription, put a reminder on your calendar to review it in three or six months, bundles are easy to add and easy to forget you’re paying for.