MultiChoice Group has shut down Showmax Pro, roughly 3 years after its launch, ahead of the planned relaunch of the Showmax platform by the end of the year.
In a notice to subscribers posted on the Showmax website, MultiChoice explained that with the upcoming relaunch of Showmax, its sports offering will focus exclusively on Premier League football, which it described as the most-watched football league in Africa.
Showmax Pro in its current form will be phased out by 30 November. More details around the refreshed pricing and the product will be shared soon.
MultiChoice has partnered with Comcast’s NBCUniversal to revamp Showmax with technology from the Peacock streaming service.
Showmax Pro will stop taking new sign-ups from today, 1 October 2023.
For customers with an auto-renewing subscription, charges will stop on 30 October 2023. They can continue streaming Showmax Pro until their last billing cycle ends.
A new sports offering focused solely on English Premier League (EPL) football will be announced with new pricing “soon”, MultiChoice said.
Showmax Pro offers streaming of live football, athletics, select boxing and fighting, and eSports.
Critics of the service often said the EPL was one of its few strengths, but the lack of rugby, cricket, tennis, motorsport, and golf meant it was not really an alternative to DStv Premium.
As compensation for the shutdown, existing Showmax Pro customers will be offered a DStv Compact Plus Stream package at the same price as Showmax Pro.
“This deal is exclusively available to existing Showmax Pro customers, who will receive emails from Showmax and DStv with more information about the deal,” the company said.
“Existing Showmax Pro subscribers in select markets will be able to stream even more live sport from SuperSport, a wide variety of live channels and more with an exclusive DStv Stream and Showmax bundle deal.”
“Customers will be able to stream 115+ live channels, access the full catalogue of DStv video-on-demand library and continue to have full access to Showmax’s entertainment catalogue.”