Myles Illidge10 October 2022
DStv provides several package choices for its customers in South Africa, with prices ranging from R29 to R839 a month.
Its middle-of-the-range packages — Compact and Family — differ in price by R120, with Compact offering 121 channels and Family featuring 90.
MyBroadband compared the two mid-tier DStv packages in terms of pricing and channel catalogues.
The major channel differences between the two products fall under the Movies and Entertainment category, where DStv Compact offers 14 more channels than DStv Family.
Other notable differences are in the Documentaries & Lifestyle and Specialist & Foreign categories, with Compact subscribers having a choice of 14 and 6 channels, respectively.
On the other hand, DStv Family gives customers a choice of nine documentary and lifestyle channels. It only has one channel in the Specialist & Foreign category.
Compact subscribers also get access to more sports channels, including SuperSport PSL, Premier League, Variety 3, and Variety 4, in addition to the sports channels included in DStv Family.
The table below shows the number of TV channels each DStv package offers and their pricing.
The prices do not include the cost of the decoder or the monthly PVR and on-demand access fee.
| DStv package and channel number comparison | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Package | Price | Number of channels | Price per channel |
| DStv Premium | R839 | 150 | R5.59 |
| DStv Compact Plus | R549 | 136 | R4.04 |
| DStv Compact | R429 | 121 | R3.55 |
| DStv Family | R309 | 90 | R3.43 |
| DStv Access | R120 | 64 | R1.88 |
| DStv EasyView | R29 | 33 | R0.88 |
| Add-ons | |||
| Access fee | R105 | ||
The lower-tier Family, Access, and EasyView packages have fewer channels, and subscribers also pay less per channel on DStv’s cheaper services.
Notably, DStv’s most expensive package, Premium, offers only 29 more channels than DStv Compact for almost double the price.
However, those 29 include MultiChoice’s premiere M-Net, movies, and SuperSport channels. It also includes BBC Earth and Bloomberg news.
DStv Compact and Family have a similar price per channel at R3.55 and R3.43, respectively.
DStv’s price increases for 2022 came into effect on 1 April. The Compact package currently costs R429 per month, while DStv Family is R309.
The table below compares DStv Family and Compact packages, highlighting key channels in each category and providing the number of channels per category.
Compact contains all of the channels Family has. Therefore, key channels listed under DStv Family are not repeated under Compact.
| Channel category | DStv Compact package | DStv Family Package | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| # | Channels | # | Channels | |
| Movies & Entertainment | 38 | M-Net Movies 3, Studio Universal, BBC Brit, BET, MTV, Idols Extra, Woordfees TV, Telemundo | 24 | M-Net Movies 4, Universal Channel, CBS Reality, kykNET & Kie, Africa Magic Epic |
| Documentaries & Lifestyle | 14 | VIA, Discovery ID, BBC Lifestyle, Food Network, Honey, HGTV | 9 | Travel Channel, National Geographic, Nat Geo Wild, WildEarth, Ignition TV |
| Free Channels | 13 | TV Mozambique Internacional | 12 | SABC 1, SABC2, SABC 3, e.TV, Soweto TV, Tshwane TV |
| Sports | 10 | SuperSport (SS) PSL, SS Premier League, SS Variety 3, ESPN, WWE | 5 | SuperSport (SS) Blitz, SS LaLiga, SS Football, SS Variety 4, TellyTrack |
| Kids & Teens | 12 | Nickelodeon, Nick Jr | 10 | Cartoon Network, Boomerang, NickTOONS, Disney, Dreamworks, PBS Kids |
| Music | 9 | KykNet Nou, Channel O, Mzanzi Music, TRACE Urban, Trace Africa, Trace Gospel | 9 | KykNet Nou, Channel O, Mzanzi Music, TRACE Urban, Trace Africa, Trace Gospel |
| Religion | 5 | Dumisa, FAITH, Day Star, TBN Africa, Emmanuel TV | 5 | Dumisa, FAITH, Day Star, TBN Africa, Emmanuel TV |
| News & Commerce | 14 | CNN International | 13 | eNCA, SABC News, BBC World News, Al Jazeera, CNBC Africa, Business Day TV |
| Specialist & Foreign | 6 | RAI Italia, Beste van Nederlands, RTPI, TV5 Monde Afrique, Deutsche Welle | 1 | CCTV 4 |
Now read: DStv competitor kills its Afrikaans channels
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