Most US online adults are no strangers to wrangling multiple subscriptions: per Forrester’s 2024 data, half of US online adults have four or more monthly subscriptions. That’s true also for just over one-third of Baby Boomers and older online adults!
Subscription companies have room to improve what they provide their customers and how to help those customers have better experiences with those subscriptions:
Despite multiple monthly subscriptions, utilization lags. Only three out of five US online adults say they take full advantage of their subscriptions. What’s more, less than half of US online adults have a clear understanding of all their subscriptions. And — gulp! — nearly one in five have multiple subscriptions that serve the same purpose. Generation Zers are more likely than older generations to have overlapping subscriptions — and to feel overwhelmed by the overall cost of their subscriptions.
Consumers are canceling subscriptions — and have mixed experiences. Half of US online adults have canceled a subscription in the last 12 months. And one in 10 are cancelling more subscriptions than they are subscribing to. But experiences around cancellation are mixed: a hefty 41% of US online adults agree that subscriptions are too hard to cancel.
Consumers want more control over their subscriptions. Two-thirds of US online adults wish they could pause their subscriptions rather than cancel outright. Over half are interested in paying for their subscriptions with pay-as-you-go models, while as many again want the option to choose their own billing dates. Furthermore, over half of younger US online adults are interested in managing subscriptions directly via their banking websites and apps, a trend we expect to grow among all generations.
US consumers’ attitudes and behaviors around subscriptions vary across generations, which we dive more deeply into in our latest report, The State Of US Consumers And Their Subscriptions, 2025. If you’re a Forrester client and you’d like to delve into these questions, please get in touch to book a Guidance Session or inquiry.
Cowritten with Eleanor Theriault, Senior Research Associate
