Before you read further you might be wondering throughout why I'm paying in British Pounds. Well dear reader, that's because I grew up there. So my life is still very much British even though I live in beautiful Poland for a while now. You'll catch me in shorts and T-Shirt when it's cold.

Now you might say, why not switch countries in your Apple account? Yes, that sounds great on paper, but I tried this once and had a one-off special case with Apple allowing me to switch back to the UK region.

The problem is, Apple does not carry over your purchases when you switch countries. You know, the stuff you bought? It'll be gone. For me that's around 400 movies right now and over 5,000 songs. I'd like to keep access to those. So this is a no go for me. It was a financial investment for over 15 years that I'm not willing to give up.

Now, Microsoft allows you to keep your stuff... even if you're in Poland. Wonder how they manage but your California based fruit company doesn't?

This is not just about inflation

Urgh, I hate politics... but "inflation" is a real problem... and it basically feeds itself. Inflation is part of life, unfortunately. Now I wish that we as the people would agree on how inflation looks like, and that we all know what that means going forward, but unfortunately it's basically controlled by idiots that have zero interest in the people that basically have to pay for it. So yeah, enough said because I might just start with the colourful British "c" word.

Let's get to the gist of it

Apple One was a great deal for us. It was, as of last year, around £30/month. That gave me the following services I use so much (all family plans):

• Apple Music: £15/month
• iCloud Storage: £7/month
• Fitness+: £10/month

That right there is already way more, individually, than I would have paid the Apple One price. So that was a steal for me.

In addition I got to dabble with Arcade and TV+, something we've been enjoying on and off. Well, only me for Arcade.

I stand by my comment that Fitness+ is one of the most important "products" that Apple has launched in a long time...

The first price hike, then the second

I'm unsure when the first price increase came, perhaps it was earlier this year in the UK. It was a small price hike, £33/month. Still I got way more than I paid for.

Over the course of the year though, our consumption of some services was basically zero. More on those services in a moment.

Now we have a second price increase... in less than 12 months. And we're looking at roughly £40/month. That's £480 per fricking year. That's nearly worth 1.5 months of private school for my daughter. Now I am not American, so I don't have this kind of money just lying around – I have to earn it. And I feel super fortunate that I can pretty much choose how I make that – I will not forget that I am lucky in this respect.

So let's finally get to the article... Why am I cutting down? Well, it's not only about the monthly cost, but it's also the problem of where I stand with the quality of their services and the fine line of alienating a normal person (oh god, don't hate me now, you'll see). I can see raised eyebrows in the back! Oh no, I can see someone press the big red "cancel" button.

I know some of the thoughts below might just ruffle feathers, and I totally get it, I really do. I've been on the receiving end of hate for a long time, even just recently, in my life. It sucks. It made me who I am today. So maybe skip past the TV+ and Fitness+ sections – even though I am super gentle on a tricky topic (promise).

Let's break down their services (that I know about).

Apple News

Great idea, terrible app and execution (but it actually has great potential). I never read a single magazine during our subscription. No one in the household ever uses it either.

Also, the "Special Coverage" can not be hidden. It's just garbage and has been over the years. "Weekend reads", really?! Spare me. Low quality "waste of time" content. Oh, just like this article!

Also... it's always "politics" in the app. Zero interest, so you gotta turn that stuff off (thankful for the toggle).

I wish they allowed me to subscribe to feeds via RSS — they used to... but not anymore. That's a huge shame. It would have probably turned into my main RSS reader.

Apple Arcade

Now I gotta say, I really like some of the games here and I was hoping that I might dip into some more — but again... mostly just garbage filler games. Yes, there are stand out games like Sasquatch and Japanese Rural Life and some others. I think they're really good games.

Again though, I'm the only person at least trying to play. But not enough to justify. Now don't ask me about Xbox Game Pass... I pay for it and love to pick up a game and play via the cloud on my Mac. I think they get it right.

Gaming, right now, is not in Apple's DNA — which is wild considering Steve Jobs' previous employment record. Maybe that'll change, but then I prefer to just buy a quality game outright on Steam or GOG.

Apple TV+

Ha, now there is some great content here. I'll give them that. But it's not worth the new price. If they offered say "15 rentals" a month from their store, then yes... but right now, they should keep it lower.

The shows have been great and mostly OK although thoroughly have been let down by their choice of actors and, I don't want to say it, political correctness — yes, there is nothing wrong with it, but I feel it's not well executed at most times. Or just cringe worthy. I'll leave that here. For me it's alienating. Perhaps it should be? Dunno.

Ted Lasso... best show. I don't even like football (thanks to a shitty childhood of bullies in England – thank you again friends). Slow Horses also great, because it's super British and full of nice words that I enjoy.

I feel the same about Disney+. I cancelled because initially I thought our daughter would enjoy it... especially the classics (which she did), but there are only so many classics. Andor was great... that's it. She feels alienated by the latest things, and so do we, so she stopped and so did we.

Apple Music

The king of my existence. I've been a long time user of iTunes... I think it's the only software I have ever used for my Music. It's come a long way.

We all use it. Siri on the HomePod mostly gets it right when picking stuff...

I've endured many years of it being an inferior product, even my wife, but I'm happy to see all the improvements that shipped in iOS17 this year — lot's of quality of life improvements that bring it very close to their competitors.

For me, right now, the killer feature is their Apple Watch app. It's a work of art. It trumps Spotify (although it's getting better).

This is one service that would be hard to give up... because it is so tied into our lives.

When Spotify launch their high definition service, I might look to them as I'll have a near 60% savings just by being in Poland. But that would also mean some hardware changes at home... and I don't like changing stuff if it ain't broken. Now they just need to give a good run at the Apple Watch app.

Again, I'd love to keep it, but I would have to change countries in my Apple profile — and that is not an option. Plus I don't like the idea of being logged into two accounts with my Apple stuff, because we all know it can be flakey.

Apple Fitness+

This one is hard to give up... As I said earlier, this is probably one of their most important products to date. One that can help many people potentially live a better life. And that's key.

I'm happy the price didn't change here much, and I think it's worth the £10/month. In fact, I think it's a steal.

However, over the months, whilst so much better this year, compared to last year: I exercise to get fitter... I turn up to have a better life, but now I am questioning why they're always celebrating something and smiling. For me this has some super fake-ness to it that really puts me off. It's alienating.

Yes, some of the jokes are amazing and funny, always find myself laughing... but then I think about the real world if I was in a gym. I don't see people smiling... and I don't see anyone starting class with "today we're celebrating 'X'" (again they toned this down considerably).

Then come the comments: "Daddy, why are you not smiling like them?"... You can only imagine. So basically I do it in secret when everyone is sleeping or not here these days... and I always use my headphones, because there are other comments too: "Why are they always celebrating?", "Oh this guy looks really old", "Why don't you exercise with this hot guy over there?", "Ugh, Yoga... boring". Sigh.

I turn up to get fit, sweaty and smelly and get my heart pumping.

I give them credit, as I have gained around 8kg of weight just from exercising (yes, gained!).

But for now, perhaps, I will look at some books instead, go back to my old routine and perhaps just go to the gym every few months and do more "body weight" exercises. I'll be celebrating just exercising, making the week, and gaining some weight.

This one will be hard to give up. Even their music choice is great... unless it's an artist spotlight.

iCloud Storage

We have loads of photos & videos. There is no 1TB plan anymore? 2TB it is. Didn't realise storage prices went up recently? Checks AWS S3 and Google Cloud storage pricing... nope.

We don't use the other stuff except Private Relay I guess.

Again I'd love to switch country here, but that means cancelling everything. Loosing everything I purchased and then worrying that my life's worth of images will be lost forever (even though I have them backed up).

Conclusion

It's not worth it to pay nearly £500 a year just for the above. It's a rip off. £300 is still a lot, but certainly better and certainly more affordable if I got the two services above individually, with Apple Music being the biggest expense.

If I can replace Apple Music with the local version of Spotify here in Poland, then that would be a probably 70% reduction in total... and that's where I'm aiming.

I think Apple wants to stay at the top, and I get it. But now we're looking at out-pricing quite a few folks for services that are "OK" for most part. It's a little frustrating.

I do love their products, and I think they nail it on the hardware for most part – and I hope there will one day be another player to give them a real run for their money.

OK, I'll leave it at that. Thanks for reading...