Xbox Game Pass Family plan launches in South Africa

Microsoft is expanding its Xbox Game Pass Ultimate Friends & Family plan to six more countries — including South Africa.

The company initially launched the shareable subscription plan in Colombia and Ireland in September 2022.

In addition to South Africa, gamers in Chile, Hungary, Israel, New Zealand, and Sweden can now sign up for the plan.

Game Pass is a gaming subscription service allowing users to play from a library of over 400 games on Xbox and PC.

Subscriptions are available for a PC-only, Xbox-only, and PC and Xbox Game Pass bundle.

Xbox Game Pass Ultimate Friends & Family allows up to five Microsoft accounts to share a single subscription.

“You can add up to four people to your membership, all with their own unique access to Xbox Game Pass Ultimate games, content, and benefits,” Microsoft stated.

In South Africa, the price of the Friends & Family plan will be R199 per month, making it R40 cheaper than taking out two separate individual Game Pass Ultimate subscriptions.

It is also R38 cheaper than using three separate standard Game Pass for console or PC subscriptions.

One console vs many

If you only want to use one console shared by multiple family members, you will only need the regular Game Pass subscription for everyone to use its benefits.

Setting it as your home console will allow users on other Microsoft accounts to share Game Pass on that system without logging into the main account.

The main advantage of the Friends & Family option is that it can be used across multiple devices.

“All the people you invite can play at the same time, even the same game,” Microsoft explains in the plan’s FAQ.

The table and infographic below compare the features and prices of Microsoft’s Game Pass plans in South Africa.

The service comes with one caveat — all add-on members must reside in the same country as the primary account holder.

If users currently on Microsoft’s normal Game Pass Ultimate subscription choose to upgrade, they will have the time on their remaining membership converted to time on the new plan.

This will be based on the monetary value of the old membership.

For example, a full month of the individual Ultimate plan will be worth 18 days of membership on the new plan.

Invited group members won’t benefit from conversion if they are already on the individual Game Pass.

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Xbox Game Pass Family plan launches in South Africa