Premium subscription price update (July 1st 2025)

[Lady-Mary]

BGA has a near-monopoly on a specific market. They are now owned by a corporate entity and there is pressure to juice that investment for everything it is worth. Expect prices to increase quicker than inflation until competition develops or people drop out in masses. Expect tiered pricing, but not until they have data to prove that existing customers quit due to the higher prices and then they can target people willing to pay more while not leaving too much money on the table.

This sadly sounds like a very good analysis.

I'm a Premium member since 2020 (Covid time) and was glad at first to support such a great service, for such a good price (24 €).
But the price goes higher and higher without detailed explanation : what are the real costs fort BGA ? How many new workers, new servers ? And what are the customers wishes ?

I do not play very often, and mostly to the same games : I do not need so many new games, so often (who can follow ?!). I'd rather pay less.
So I'm now considering the renew of my membership too (new price will be 42 € = + 75% in 5 years )

A good option for me would be tiered pricing : paying more or less depending of the way we play : big player, occasional one...

And asking the customers for their advice on a new pricing before increasing the price would have been a nice way of considering them : it's a shame that nobody in the staff seemed to have thinked of it !

[KA1976]

In the last two years, what we have seen most at BGA have been price increases and increased instability on the website.

And a dearth of new games. That development and licensure doesn't come free my friend.

My gods you people. The content we were getting before was underpriced and this increase is minor. There are plenty of other things out there to bitch about for price increases. You likely the same people teat would drop 150 on some Kickstarter garbage without blinking san eye.

This isn't one of the overpriced bloatware things. Move on.

[SkeletonChief]

I'm not against a price increase, it just feels less fine with the recent lack of communication. It seems nobody answers comments in the news feed or the requests for some games. Or am I just missing all the official answers?

I see the game devs doing their good work and Nekonyancer and other tutorial devs doing theirs, but other than than it's as if the site just runs automatically. Which I know is not the case but feels that way.

[CuriousPhilomath]

In the last two years, what we have seen most at BGA have been price increases and increased instability on the website.

And a dearth of new games. That development and licensure doesn't come free my friend.

I don't think 'dearth' is the word you were looking for there, unless you were being sarcastic. It means "scarcity; a lack or short supply."

[JackNapis]

And a dearth of new games. That development and licensure doesn't come free my friend.

Is "dearth" the word you meant to use? It means "an inadequate supply; scarcity; lack", but based on the second sentence I think you meant the opposite. We have indeed been getting a lot of new games.

[Countes-Olivia-Manny]

I have a sense of nostalgia for the original creators of Board Game Arena.

The current ownership appears primarily interested in developing new games.

It would be beneficial to introduce additional features and establish a new league to enhance the user experience.

[Deltapixel]

Is there any way to renew the membership before the price increases? My renewal date is in July, but I'd like to renew for another year in advance of the renewal date.

I renewed my sub today which still had 3 months left. Now it says I have 1 year left. I hope it's just a visual bug.

[djchadb]

It's true there have been a lot more server/lag issues over the past year or so, which are frustrating, but of all my annual digital subscriptions, this is still the cheapest and probably provides me with the most value.

I understand everyone's financial situation is different, but I also agree the site was underpriced for a long time, and even at $42 USD a year ($3.50 a month) it's still a bargain, IMO.

I appreciate the fact that it's free to a lot of people who can get introduced to new games in the hobby without paying, and I can invite friends who aren't premium to premium games without them having to be paid members as well.

Fix the bugs, keep up the good work!

[bookman01]

I didn’t see any mention of the loyalty reward in my price update notification email.
You must have had a paid subscription for at least 6 years to be eligible for the reward.

[/quote]

I think you are doing a disservice to the community that really made this site popular. Those of us who joined during the start of covid, March of 2020, to when the site stabilized from the massive increase in players later that year, have been here for about 5 years. Is the reward so valuable that you chose to leave us out?

I also think you really need to focus more resources on platform stability, reliability, and bugs as previously mentioned. I don’t need more games until I can have access to them when I want to play/ need to take my turn based turn in a tournament

I hope I don’t need to remind you that your large audience in the USA is dealing with a financially turbulent economy. Everything costs more while our income is flat. I likely won’t be renewing my annual subscription.

[T72on1]

It's true there have been a lot more server/lag issues over the past year or so, which are frustrating, but of all my annual digital subscriptions, this is still the cheapest and probably provides me with the most value.

I understand everyone's financial situation is different, but I also agree the site was underpriced for a long time, and even at $42 USD a year ($3.50 a month) it's still a bargain, IMO.

I appreciate the fact that it's free to a lot of people who can get introduced to new games in the hobby without paying, and I can invite friends who aren't premium to premium games without them having to be paid members as well.

Fix the bugs, keep up the good work!

I could not have said it any better!