DStv is about to make one of its biggest changes to its South African package structure in years, separating sports and entertainment into more targeted offerings while creating cheaper streaming entry points.
Kenya has been moving in a different direction.
From September 17, South African customers will be able to subscribe to a dedicated Sports package for R399 a month or a Movies & Series package for R500. Starter will cost R99, while Select will cost R299. Premium remains at R799 for streaming customers.
The restructuring gives subscribers more control over the type of content they pay for. Someone primarily interested in sport can choose Sports, while a customer focused on films and series can buy a dedicated entertainment package.
Kenya has seen significant changes to DStv pricing and access, but not this kind of content-level unbundling.
That distinction matters because the Kenyan market has gone through a sharp subscriber contraction, a substantial recovery and another decline within less than a year.
Kenya’s DStv numbers tell a more complicated story
DStv subscriptions in Kenya fell from about 1.19 million in June 2024 to 188,824 in June 2025.
The decline was followed by a sharp recovery. The Communications Authority of Kenya recorded 270,017 active DStv subscriptions in September 2025 and 270,503 in December.
By March 2026, however, the number had fallen to 248,053, an 8.3% decline from December.
The wider broadcasting market also contracted during the quarter. Total active broadcasting subscriptions fell 5.1% to 1.58 million, while GOtv subscriptions fell 8% and Zuku’s DTH subscriptions declined 9%.
The trajectory therefore cannot be reduced to a simple collapse-and-recovery story. DStv recovered a significant portion of the customers lost by June 2025, but that recovery had already begun to reverse by early 2026.
The regulator’s figures also do not establish why individual customers left or returned. They show the movement in active subscriptions, not the specific reasons behind it.
Kenya has already seen major price changes
MultiChoice’s response in Kenya has included recurring subscription-price changes.
In August 2025, DStv raised monthly prices across its Kenyan residential packages. Premium increased to KSh11,700, Compact Plus to KSh7,300, Compact to KSh4,200, Family to KSh2,250 and Access to KSh1,450. Lite was set at KSh750.
At the same time, MultiChoice reduced the prices of several Showmax plans, including its General Entertainment and Premier League mobile products.
The company subsequently moved in the opposite direction on the cost of joining DStv.
In November 2025, MultiChoice cut the DStv Zapper decoder price from KSh1,199 to KSh850 and reduced the DStv dish kit from KSh2,000 to KSh1,650.
That distinction is important.
Kenya has seen changes to both recurring subscription prices and the upfront cost of access. What it has not yet received is the South African approach of splitting a traditional DStv proposition into dedicated content categories such as Sports and Movies & Series.
The company has also been pushing more content down the package ladder
The Kenyan story is not simply about cheaper hardware.
MultiChoice has also been expanding access to major sporting events beyond its highest-priced packages. In 2026, SuperSport made all 104 FIFA World Cup matches available across Access, Family, Compact, Compact Plus and Premium in South Africa, while other lower-priced tiers also gained additional sports and entertainment content.
That is a different form of product restructuring.
Instead of asking customers to pay for a completely separate sports package, MultiChoice has been putting more valuable content into lower tiers.
The approach matters in Kenya because sport remains one of the strongest reasons for customers to retain pay-TV subscriptions. It also suggests that the company has more than one way to make DStv’s lower tiers more attractive.
A dedicated Sports package is one option. Putting selected sports into cheaper existing packages is another.
There is no public evidence that MultiChoice intends to introduce the South African Sports package in Kenya.
The Showmax exit changes the equation
Kenya’s streaming proposition has also changed significantly since the South African package overhaul was conceived.
Showmax, which previously operated as a separate streaming service, was discontinued at the end of April 2026.
MultiChoice began moving eligible Showmax customers toward DStv Stream before the shutdown. In April, the company offered eligible users a temporary DStv Stream Compact trial as part of the transition.
Selected Showmax content has subsequently been incorporated into DStv Stream rather than maintained through a standalone Showmax service.
That creates an interesting contrast with the new South African DStv packages.
On one side, DStv is becoming more granular in South Africa, allowing customers to choose between dedicated content propositions.
On the other, MultiChoice is consolidating its standalone streaming services into DStv Stream across the wider African business.
The strategy is therefore moving in two directions at once: more choice inside DStv’s South African package structure, but greater consolidation of the streaming brands around DStv Stream.
Kenya is becoming more suitable for streaming, regardless of DStv
The broader connectivity market also makes the Kenyan question more relevant.
The CA recorded 62.6 million mobile data and internet subscriptions in the quarter ended March 2026. Mobile broadband accounted for 84.4% of those subscriptions, while mobile broadband consumption reached about 800 million GB, up 6% during the quarter.
Fixed data subscriptions reached 2.66 million, up 7.9%, with fibre connections rising to 1.47 million.
Those numbers do not prove that Kenyans are replacing DStv with streaming services.
They do, however, describe a market in which the infrastructure for internet-delivered video is expanding.
MultiChoice has been responding to that shift through DStv Stream and distribution partnerships. In 2024, it partnered with Safaricom to distribute Showmax and DStv Stream content through the operator’s ecosystem, giving the streaming proposition another route into Kenyan households.
The later shutdown of Showmax means that strategy now sits increasingly around DStv Stream rather than two separate streaming brands.
Canal+ has another reason to think beyond the traditional decoder
Canal+ completed its acquisition of MultiChoice in 2025, bringing DStv into a much larger African and international media group.
Its strategy cannot necessarily be expected to produce identical products in every market.
South Africa has its own regulatory structure, competitive landscape and subscriber economics. Kenya has different household incomes, payment patterns, connectivity conditions and levels of satellite and internet adoption.
That makes it premature to assume that the new South African package structure will simply be copied into Kenya.
The more relevant question is whether the economics that prompted the South African restructuring also exist in Kenya.
Kenya’s DStv subscriber base remains substantially below its June 2024 level despite the recovery recorded in late 2025. The March 2026 decline adds another reason for MultiChoice to keep examining how much customers are willing to pay and what they expect in return.
The next DStv move in Kenya remains unclear
South Africa now offers a clear example of what a more modular DStv proposition can look like.
Kenya has taken a different route so far: subscription-price changes, cheaper hardware, broader access to selected sports content and a stronger push toward streaming.
That does not mean Kenya is being left out of the company’s product strategy.
It means MultiChoice and Canal+ have been addressing the Kenyan market through different levers.
The unanswered question is whether those measures will be enough if the Kenyan subscriber base continues to fluctuate.
A South African customer can soon choose a package built around sport or movies and series. A Kenyan customer still buys into the established DStv hierarchy.
If Canal+ eventually decides that Kenyan subscribers also need more control over what they pay for, the South African restructuring provides an obvious blueprint.
For now, however, there is no public commitment to bring those packages to Kenya.
The more immediate shift is already visible: DStv is moving away from a model built primarily around large satellite bouquets, while MultiChoice consolidates its streaming products around DStv Stream and looks for cheaper ways to keep customers inside the ecosystem.
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