South Africans love to complain about the price of DStv, South Africa’s main pay-television platform owned by MultiChoice Group.

But how does the price of DStv Premium, the broadcaster’s top-end bouquet, compare to similar offerings from pay-TV operators elsewhere in the world?

TechCentral decided to investigate – and its findings are somewhat surprising.

We compared the cost of DStv Premium in South Africa, Zimbabwe and Nigeria to similar products in the UK, the US, Germany, Australia and Canada.

Our findings show that on a purely exchange rate-based price comparison, DStv Premium in South Africa is relatively cheap at R879/month (R799/month for streaming without a set-top box), second only to DStv Premium in Nigeria, which costs the equivalent of R590 for the satellite version.

The most expensive bouquet in the countries we researched is from Dish TV in the US, which also happens to have the highest number of channels at 290 (most packages in other markets have fewer than 200).

DStv Premium vs the world

Dish TV does not have a streaming option, but its competitor, Comcast-owned Xfinity’s Ultimate TV, is internet based and R788 cheaper than Dish TV. The much lower price is an extreme example of a worldwide trend in subscription television pricing.

Country	Package	Domestic pricing per month	Rand equivalent at time of publication
UK	Sky Q – Sky TV and Netflix (satellite option with Sky Sports included at extra £20/month)	£51	R1 179
UK	Sky Stream – Sky Sports, Sky TV and Netflix (streaming only)	£46	R1 063
Germany	All Sky – Entertainment, Cinema, Sport, Bundesliga	€58	R1 172
Australia	Foxtel Platinum Plus – iQ5 set-top box, Foxtel Plus, Movies HD, Sports HD and Netflix	A$99	R1 201
Canada	Bell – Fibe TV Best – 20 radio channels, 165 channels with sports included	C$137	R1 903
US	Dish TV – America’s Top 250 Channels – 290 total channels including sports	US$110	R2 100
US	Xfinity Ultimate TV – 185+ channels including Disney XD, Nat Geo Wild and sports such as the Premier League and Formula 1	US$68.50	R1 312
S Africa	DStv Premium (satellite and streaming) – 135+ channels with sports included	R879	R879
S Africa	DStv Premium streaming only – 135+ channels with sports included	R799	R799
Zambia	DStv Premium	ZK1 200	R1 056
Nigeria	DStv Premium	N24 500	R590
Zimbabwe	DStv Premium	US$75	R1 436

Interesting to note is that MultiChoice does not offer its sports channels – branded SuperSport – as a separate option in any of its markets, forcing customers who want access to the full SuperSport offering to subscribe to DStv Premium instead of one of its lower-priced plans.

By contrast, separate sports packages are available in Australia, Germany, Canada and the US for a fraction of the cost of a full-service package.