You will find confident answers to this question all over the internet: $219 a month, more than $1,000 a year, a dozen subscriptions each. Most of them trace back to a handful of private surveys, some years old, often quoted with the wrong unit or date. The honest answer is less tidy. No US government agency measures "subscriptions" as a category. What exists is official data on specific services people usually pay for monthly, plus surveys that each define subscriptions their own way.
We went back to the original sources, read each one, and kept only figures we could trace to the publisher. This page shows what they say, what they don't, and what common household setups cost at today's verified prices.
Key findings
Streaming is replacing cable in official data. Average household spending on video streaming and rentals rose from $65 in 2019 to $191 in 2025, while cable and satellite TV fell from $647 to $424 (BLS).[1][2]
Media subscriptions are a small slice of the budget on paper: about $674 a year, or 0.8% of average household spending, across the five media services BLS reports separately. That is probably an undercount.
Nine in ten households pay for streaming video, with an average of four services (Deloitte, late 2025).[7]
Most households keep streaming costs modest: two-thirds of Bank of America client households paying for streaming spent under $40 a month on streaming TV and music; about 10% spent over $100.[8]
People cancel often: 41% of US consumers cancelled a streaming video service in the previous six months (Deloitte).[13]
Losing track is common: in a 2022 survey, people guessed they spent $86 a month on subscriptions, then counted $219 (C+R Research, per person).[16]
What official data shows
The Bureau of Labor Statistics' Consumer Expenditure Surveys (CE) are the main official source on what US households spend. BLS reports spending per "consumer unit", which is close to a household: people who live together and share their finances. In 2025, the average consumer unit spent $81,905 in total.[3] CE has no "subscriptions" line, but several of its items are services almost everyone pays for monthly.
Cable and satellite TV
Video streaming and rentals
Mean annual spending per consumer unit, US dollars, not adjusted for inflation. Source: BLS Consumer Expenditure Surveys (series CXU270310LB0101M and CXU310243LB0101M). Every value is in the table below.
Year
Cable and satellite TV
Video streaming and rentals
Audio streaming
Internet service
2019
$647
$65
$14
$556
2020
$626
$87
$17
$611
2021
$575
$114
$20
$646
2022
$535
$140
$25
$679
2023
$492
$159
$29
$700
2024
$454
$185
$35
$698
2025
$424
$191
$36
$720
BLS item names: "Cable and satellite television services", "Rental, streaming, and downloading videos", "Streaming and downloading audio", "Computer information services (internet)". Mean per consumer unit, all US consumer units.
Add the five media services BLS lists separately (cable and satellite TV, video streaming and rentals, audio streaming, satellite radio at $17 and online gaming services at $6) and the average household spent about $674 in 2025, or $56 a month. That is 0.8% of all household spending. Internet service ($720) is a large recurring bill too, but most people think of it as a utility rather than a subscription.
Why the official figure is probably too low
Household surveys tend to miss small, automatic payments, and the numbers suggest that happens here. Multiply the CE average for video streaming ($191) by the 138.0 million US consumer units and you get about $26.4 billion. The Bureau of Economic Analysis, which builds the national accounts from business data, puts consumer spending on video streaming and rental at $59.1 billion for the same year.[4] The survey captures only about 45% of it. The two sources define and collect spending differently, so this is a rough check, not a correction.
The national accounts tell the same story about direction: spending on cable, satellite and other live TV was $79.0 billion in 2025,[5] still more than the $71.0 billion spent on video and audio streaming and rental combined,[6] but cable is shrinking and streaming is growing.
What streaming households pay
Three large studies describe streaming households from different angles. They measure different things, so we show them side by side rather than averaging them.
Finding
What was measured
Source
90% of US households pay for streaming video, 4 services on average
Online survey of 3,575 US consumers aged 14+, October to November 2025
Streaming subscriptions are not set-and-forget for everyone. Deloitte found 41% of US consumers had cancelled a streaming video service in the previous six months.[13] Antenna, which measures subscriptions from a large consumer panel, reports that premium streaming services lost on average 4.6% of their US subscribers each month in 2025[14] (Antenna doesn't publish its panel size). And in January 2026, 55% of US adults told a Harris Poll for NerdWallet that they plan to significantly cut the number of subscriptions they have this year.[15] That is an intention, not a measure of what people later did.
How much goes unnoticed
Note the dates. The best-designed studies of forgotten subscriptions are from 2022 and 2023. Nobody has repeated them with the same method since, as far as we could find.
People underestimate. Asked to guess, 1,000 US consumers said they spent $86 a month on subscriptions; after listing them one by one, the average was $219, and 42% said they had stopped using a service but forgot they were still paying (C+R Research, April to May 2022, per person).[16][17]
Unwanted charges are common. 51% of US adults who had ever had a subscription or membership had been charged for one they didn't want (Bankrate/YouGov, January 2022, 2,497 adults).[18]
A third feel they're wasting money. 36% of US adults with a paid subscription said they feel they waste money on subscriptions; the average adult had about 2 paid media and entertainment subscriptions (Consumer Reports survey by NORC, May 2023, 2,000 adults).[19][20]
Numbers you'll see elsewhere
"Americans spend $219 a month on subscriptions." Real, but it's the 2022 C+R figure above: per person, from one survey, and four years old. It is often quoted as a household figure or as current data. It is neither.
"More than $1,000 a year." Usually from CNET's annual subscription surveys, which ask adults who paid for a subscription in the past year. We couldn't read the original survey write-up ourselves, so we don't use its figures here.
"The average American has 12 subscriptions." We couldn't find an original source for this or similar counts. The most rigorous count we found (Consumer Reports and NORC, 2023) is about 2 paid media subscriptions per adult.
Any "official" subscription total. No US agency publishes one.
What common setups cost today
Surveys can't tell you what a particular combination of services costs. Our price database can. These are modelled examples, not measured spending: each adds up current US list prices before tax, read on each provider's own website on Oct 23, 2026, paying monthly.
Example
Services (plan)
Per month
Per year
Light streamer One adult, one video service with ads and music
Netflix Standard with ads $8.99 · Spotify Premium Individual $12.99
$21.98
$263.76
Apple household A family on Apple One plus Netflix
Apple One Family $27.95 · Netflix Standard $19.99
$47.94
$575.28
Typical streaming family Three video services in one bundle, Netflix, family music and Amazon Prime
Netflix Standard $19.99 · Disney+, Hulu, HBO Max bundle With ads $21.99 · Spotify Premium Family $21.99 · Amazon Prime $14.99 Amazon Prime is counted at its monthly price; paid yearly it is $139.
$78.96
$947.52
Cord-cutter with live TV Live TV streaming instead of cable, plus Netflix and music
YouTube TV Base plan $82.99 · Netflix Standard $19.99 · Spotify Premium Individual $12.99
$115.97
$1,391.64
Heavy digital household Premium video, music, an AI assistant, office apps and cloud storage
Netflix Premium $26.99 · Disney+, Hulu, HBO Max bundle No ads $34.99 · Paramount+ Premium $13.99 · Apple TV $14.99 · Spotify Premium Family $21.99 · ChatGPT Plus $20.00 · Microsoft 365 Family $12.99 · Dropbox Plus $11.99
We found no reliable US data on how many people choose yearly billing. What we can show is what it saves. Among plans in our database that sell both a monthly and a yearly price, paying yearly costs 16.6% to 22.7% less, roughly two months free. Netflix, Spotify, Apple TV and Apple Music showed no yearly price on the US pages we checked.
Plan
12 monthly payments
Yearly price
You save
Amazon Prime
$179.88
$139.00
$40.88 (22.7%)
Claude Pro
$240.00
$200.00
$40.00 (16.7%)
HBO Max Premium
$275.88
$229.99
$45.89 (16.6%)
Disney+ Premium (No Ads)
$257.88
$214.99
$42.89 (16.6%)
Peacock Premium Plus
$239.88
$199.99
$39.89 (16.6%)
Google AI Pro
$239.88
$199.99
$39.89 (16.6%)
Microsoft 365 Premium
$239.88
$199.99
$39.89 (16.6%)
HBO Max Standard
$221.88
$184.99
$36.89 (16.6%)
YouTube Premium Individual
$191.88
$159.99
$31.89 (16.6%)
Paramount+ Premium
$167.88
$139.99
$27.89 (16.6%)
Peacock Premium
$155.88
$129.99
$25.89 (16.6%)
Microsoft 365 Family
$155.88
$129.99
$25.89 (16.6%)
HBO Max Basic With Ads
$131.88
$109.99
$21.89 (16.6%)
Microsoft 365 Personal
$119.88
$99.99
$19.89 (16.6%)
Paramount+ Essential
$107.88
$89.99
$17.89 (16.6%)
Peacock Select
$107.88
$89.99
$17.89 (16.6%)
What this means for your own spending
Averages hide a wide range, and the research agrees on one thing: people tend to undercount what they pay. The only number that matters is yours.
Count it properly. Go through 12 months of card statements (yearly plans only charge once). Our step-by-step guide covers app stores, PayPal and email receipts.
Put it in one list. The free MapSub tracker keeps your list in your browser, totals every billing cycle and shows what renews next. Prefer a spreadsheet? Use the tracker template.
We searched for US data on subscription spending from government statistics, research organisations, financial institutions and industry surveys, then read each figure on the publisher's own page, report or data file. For each we recorded the publisher, date, fieldwork period, sample, population and definition. We used a figure only if we could read it in the original. We did not combine figures from different sources into an average, because they count different things (per person or per household, all subscriptions or only streaming, survey answers or payments). The full source log, including figures we rejected and why, is kept with our research files.
Several sources are companies with a commercial interest in subscriptions (Bank of America, Deloitte, Antenna, NerdWallet, C+R Research, Bankrate); we say so where it matters. Survey results describe what respondents said; BLS and BEA data are official statistics. MapSub has not run its own survey. The household examples are models built from list prices.
We'll update this page when BLS and BEA publish their next annual figures and when our monthly price check changes a price used above.
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Consumer Expenditure Surveys (LABSTAT series via BLS Public Data API). CE item 270310 'Cable and satellite television services', mean annual expenditure, all consumer units, 2025. data.bls.gov. Published 2026-10-29. Data: Calendar year 2025 (Interview and Diary surveys). Oct-Nov 2025 not collected (appropriations lapse); BLS used a weight adjustment. Sample: CE national sample; respondent count not read (BLS does not print it in the release). Population: All U.S. consumer units (137,994 thousand in 2025; 2.4 people per unit on average).
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Consumer Expenditure Surveys (LABSTAT series via BLS Public Data API). CE item 310243 'Rental, streaming, and downloading videos', mean annual expenditure, all consumer units, 2025. data.bls.gov. Published 2026-10-29. Data: Calendar year 2025 (Interview and Diary surveys). Oct-Nov 2025 not collected (appropriations lapse); BLS used a weight adjustment. Sample: CE national sample; respondent count not read (BLS does not print it in the release). Population: All U.S. consumer units (137,994 thousand in 2025; 2.4 people per unit on average).
U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, Consumer Expenditure Surveys. Average annual expenditures, all consumer units, 2025. bls.gov. Published 2026-10-29. Data: Calendar year 2025 (Interview and Diary surveys). Oct-Nov 2025 not collected (appropriations lapse); BLS used a weight adjustment. Sample: CE national sample; respondent count not read (BLS does not print it in the release). Population: All U.S. consumer units (137,994 thousand in 2025; 2.4 people per unit on average).
U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, NIPA Table 2.4.5U (PCE by type of product). PCE, 'Video streaming and rental', 2025, current dollars (series LA000233, Table 2.4.5U line 224). apps.bea.gov. Published 2026-10-29 (file last-modified). Data: Calendar year 2025 (annual estimate; data file last modified 2026-10-29). Sample: n/a (national accounts). Population: U.S. personal consumption expenditures (households and NPISHs).
U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, NIPA Table 2.4.5U (PCE by type of product). PCE, 'Cable, satellite, and other live television services', 2025, current dollars (series DCTVRC, Table 2.4.5U line 219). apps.bea.gov. Published 2026-10-29 (file last-modified). Data: Calendar year 2025 (annual estimate; data file last modified 2026-10-29). Sample: n/a (national accounts). Population: U.S. personal consumption expenditures (households and NPISHs).
U.S. Bureau of Economic Analysis, NIPA Table 2.4.5U (PCE by type of product). PCE, 'Video and audio streaming and rental', 2025, current dollars (series DVIDRC, Table 2.4.5U line 223). apps.bea.gov. Published 2026-10-29 (file last-modified). Data: Calendar year 2025 (annual estimate; data file last modified 2026-10-29). Sample: n/a (national accounts). Population: U.S. personal consumption expenditures (households and NPISHs).
Deloitte (2026 Digital Media Trends). Share of U.S. households with a paid SVOD service, and average number of services. deloitte.com. Published 2026-03-25. Data: Oct-Nov 2025. Sample: 3,575 U.S. consumers (online, independent research firm, weighted to Census). Population: U.S. consumers age 14+ (household questions answered by respondent).
Bank of America Institute ('Streaming: From trickle to torrent'). Share of households paying under $40/month for streaming TV and music. institute.bankofamerica.com. Published 2025-08-27. Data: May-July 2025 (3-month average). Sample: Not stated (Bank of America internal transaction data). Population: Bank of America client households with streaming payments.
Bank of America Institute. Share paying over $80/month; share paying over $100/month. institute.bankofamerica.com. Published 2025-08-27. Data: May-July 2025. Sample: Not stated. Population: Bank of America client households with streaming payments.
Pew Research Center. Share of U.S. adults who ever watch programming on streaming services. pewresearch.org. Published 2025-07-01. Data: 2025-04-14 to 2025-04-20. Sample: 9,397 U.S. adults (American Trends Panel, wave 168); MoE +/-1.3 pts. Population: U.S. adults 18+.
Pew Research Center. Share of U.S. adults who currently subscribe to cable or satellite TV at home. pewresearch.org. Published 2025-07-01. Data: 2025-04-14 to 2025-04-20. Sample: 9,397 U.S. adults (American Trends Panel, wave 168); MoE +/-1.3 pts. Population: U.S. adults 18+.
Pew Research Center. Among streaming users, share saying the services they watch are worth the cost. pewresearch.org. Published 2025-07-01. Data: 2025-04-14 to 2025-04-20. Sample: 9,397 U.S. adults (American Trends Panel, wave 168); MoE +/-1.3 pts. Population: U.S. adults 18+.
Deloitte (2026 Digital Media Trends). Share of consumers who cancelled an SVOD service in the last six months. deloitte.com. Published 2026-03-25. Data: Oct-Nov 2025. Sample: 3,575 U.S. consumers (online, independent research firm, weighted to Census). Population: U.S. consumers age 14+ (household questions answered by respondent).
Antenna (Q1'26 State of Subscriptions: Premium SVOD 2025 Year in Review). Weighted average monthly churn rate, Premium SVOD, 2025. antenna.live. Published 2026-02-24. Data: Calendar 2025. Sample: Panel size not published ('millions' of opt-in transaction records). Population: U.S. subscribers to Premium SVOD services (50 states + DC). Method details incomplete in the original.
NerdWallet (survey by The Harris Poll). Share planning to significantly decrease the number of subscriptions in 2026. nerdwallet.com. Published 2026 (studies page; coverage 2026-04-07). Data: 2026-01-06 to 2026-01-08. Sample: 2,096 U.S. adults. Population: U.S. adults 18+.
C+R Research ('Subscription Service Statistics and Costs'). Average monthly subscription spend after itemizing vs 10-second estimate. crresearch.com. Published 2022-05-18 (date per FTC citation; page 'Last Updated' 2024-07-26). Data: 2022-04-22 to 2022-05-02. Sample: 1,000 'self-reporting consumers'. Population: U.S. consumers (age mix Gen Z to Boomers, avg age 43).
C+R Research. Share who stopped using a service but kept paying; share saying recurring charges are easy to forget. crresearch.com. Published 2022-05-18. Data: 2022-04-22 to 2022-05-02. Sample: 1,000. Population: U.S. consumers.
Bankrate (survey by YouGov), press release PDF. Share who incurred unwanted subscription/membership charges. bankrate.com. Published 2022-02-07. Data: 2022-01-12 to 2022-01-14. Sample: 2,497 U.S. adults (online, non-probability, weighted). Population: U.S. adults who have ever had a subscription or membership account.
Consumer Reports (American Experiences Survey, NORC AmeriSpeak). Average number of paid subscriptions by category (calculated from banded answers). article.images.consumerreports.org. Published 2023-05 (topline PDF). Data: 2023-05-05 to 2023-05-16. Sample: 2,000 U.S. adults (1,866 web, 134 phone); MoE +/-2.63. Population: U.S. adults.
Consumer Reports (AES May 2023). Share who feel they are wasting money on subscriptions. article.images.consumerreports.org. Published 2023-05. Data: 2023-05-05 to 2023-05-16. Sample: 1,743-1,774 adults with any subscription. Population: U.S. adults with any paid subscription in four categories.
Questions and answers
How much does the average American spend on subscriptions?
There is no official figure, because no US agency measures "subscriptions" as one category. Official data covers specific services: in 2025 the average US household (BLS "consumer unit") spent $191 on video streaming and rentals, $36 on audio streaming and $424 on cable and satellite TV. Private surveys that ask about all subscriptions give much higher per-person figures, but they use different definitions and some are several years old.
Is the "$219 a month" subscription figure accurate?
It comes from a C+R Research survey of 1,000 US consumers in April and May 2022. It is a per-person figure from people who first guessed they spent $86 and then listed their subscriptions one by one. It is not household spending and not current data, though it is often quoted as both.
How many streaming services does a typical household have?
Deloitte's 2026 Digital Media Trends survey (3,575 US consumers, October to November 2025) found 90% of US households pay for at least one streaming video service, with an average of four.
Is streaming now more expensive than cable?
Not on average, yet. In 2025 BLS data, households spent $424 on cable and satellite TV and $227 on video and audio streaming. But the gap is closing fast: in 2019 it was $647 against $79.
Is it cheaper to pay for subscriptions yearly?
Usually, when a yearly plan exists. Among the plans in MapSub's price database that sell both, paying yearly costs 16.6% to 22.7% less than 12 monthly payments. It only saves money if you keep the service for the whole year.
