Xbox Game Pass shed millions of subscribers following a steep 50% price increase in October 2025. Xbox Chief Strategy Officer Matthew Ball confirmed this at The Game Business Live event on June 8, 2026, speaking alongside show host Christopher Dring during Summer Game Fest. The admission is one of the most direct public acknowledgments Microsoft has made about the damage caused by last year’s price change.
What Matthew Ball Said
Ball told The Game Business Live that Xbox “shed millions of subscribers over the span of a few months” after the price hike. The statement was first shared publicly by The Game Awards host Geoff Keighley on X.
Ball did not give a specific subscriber count. The last publicly reported Game Pass figures hovered between 35 and 38 million. Going by the scale of losses Ball described, current numbers may be closer to 30 million.
The October 2025 price change raised Game Pass Ultimate from $19.99 to $29.99 per month. That is a 50% increase. At the time, users rushed to cancel their memberships in large enough numbers that Microsoft’s cancellation page reportedly crashed.
Xbox CEO Asha Sharma Had Already Flagged the Problem
Ball’s comments at The Game Business Live were not entirely new ground. Last month, Xbox CEO Asha Sharma sent a note to employees that “growth slowed down and subscriber loss accelerated after the pricing and SKU changes last year.” She described a recent Game Pass price cut as “a good first step” and told staff they would “have to outwork the problem in front of us in our path to restore durable growth.”
Sharma did not share specific numbers in that note. She has since said the changes are “helping move Xbox in the right direction,” with subscriber retention improving after the price reduction took effect.
Ball Joined Xbox in Late May 2026
Matthew Ball was appointed Xbox Chief Strategy Officer in late May 2026. He came from outside the company. Before joining Microsoft, he worked as a games industry analyst and was CEO of Epyllion, a venture investment and advisory firm. He also served as head of strategy and planning at Amazon Studios.
Ball said that when he first sat down with Sharma, she asked him directly: “Is it fixable?” He said yes. “I’m a strategic optimist,” Ball told the audience at The Game Business Live. “I think it’s incredibly defeatist to think that in any scenario you can’t do better.”
The 100 Million Subscriber Target Looks Harder Now
Before the price hike, Game Pass was projected to reach 100 million subscribers by 2030. With subscriber counts now lower than they were a year ago, that target requires more than tripling the current user base in under four years.
Ball acknowledged the challenge but said he believes the service can recover under current leadership. He pointed to a plan involving a “reliable pipeline” of exclusives to give Xbox players a reason to stay subscribed.
