It appears that Sling TV is still in hot water as it continues to experience subscriber churn. Parent company Dish reported its Q2 2023 earnings results on Tuesday, revealing a loss of 97,000 Sling TV subscribers. In retrospect, this is a slight improvement from the whopping 234,000 customers who left the service in Q1. However, the fourth quarter only saw a drop in 77,000 users.
The decline is significant considering that Sling TV was among the first live TV streaming services to hit the market in 2015. Now it lags behind competitors Hulu Live TV and YouTube TV with only 2 million subscribers total — Sling TV’s lowest number of users in five years.
While Sling TV is on the affordable side of live TV streamers — starting at $40/month — it also provides fewer channels than rivals, which likely deters some potential subscribers. In an attempt to keep up with other competitors, Sling TV launched user profiles and a Sports Scores feature earlier this year.
The streamer increased its subscription prices last year by $5.
On the other hand, the company is also betting on advertising to grow its business. It recently launched Sling Freestream, its free ad-supported TV (FAST) service, offering over 300 live TV channels and more than 41,000 on-demand titles. Sling Freestream is available through the Sling TV app, and users don’t need to pay for a subscription to access the free content.