Hulu just announced that it's adding ads to its ad-free plans, raising more than a few eyebrows. But before you hit unsubscribe, rest assured it isn't doing this to take advantage of current customers.
The update only applies to sports and other live events that would have ad space built in anyway
A Hulu spokesperson
In a surprise email to customers yesterday, Hulu announced it was making changes to its subscriber agreement. Among them were seemingly innocuous tweaks, such as updates to billing and payment processes or "clarifying that the same arbitration agreement applies to Disney Plus, ESPN Plus, and Hulu" — the same arbitration agreement that led Disney to try and get a $50,000 Disney World wrongful death suit tossed out because the deceased was a Disney Plus subscriber (so if you're a Hulu subscriber don't die at Disney World!). But the biggest change was "circumstances may require that certain titles and types of content include ads, even in our 'no ads' or 'ad free' subscription tiers."
Now this isn't unheard of. Netflix, Peacock, Max and Paramount Plus are among the streaming services that still insert ads into their ad-free plans due to live events and sports. But Hulu didn't explicitly state that this was the case. Instead, it merely chalked up the change to increasing "the breadth and depth of the content we make available to you."
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Ultimately, it did turn out that this meant live events and sports. The outlet AV Club reached out to Hulu for comment following the announcement and received a response stating, "The update only applies to sports and other live events that would have ad space built in anyway." So rest assured that Hulu has no plans to insert ads into your ad-free plans for now.
That said, it's unclear if this new ambiguous language precludes them from inserting ads in other places, even for ad-free customers. After all, it was just last year that Prime Video was sued for adding ads to its streaming service unless you started paying an extra $2.99 a month. Still, for now, we remain confident that an ad-free Hulu plan will allow you to skip ads when it comes to movies and shows, excluding live TV broadcasts.
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