Is DStv turning its back on low-income viewers?

DStv’s R30 EasyView package is still available, but no longer easy to find online. For low-income viewers, that raises a bigger question about access.

For years, DStv EasyView has been the “at least we can still watch something” package.

At R30 a month, it has offered budget-conscious households a small but useful selection of entertainment, news, religious, educational, and radio channels. No bells. No whistles. But for many South Africans, it has been affordable television in a country where “affordable” is doing a lot of heavy lifting.

Now, EasyView has quietly disappeared from DStv’s website as an online package customers can buy. When users click through to purchase DStv, they are shown five options: Premium, Compact Plus, Compact, Family, and Access. Searching for EasyView reportedly points customers to the DStv Family page instead.

MyBroadband first reported the change, and Canal+ confirmed to the publication that EasyView had been removed from the website, although it said the package is still available through WhatsApp and DStv call centre channels.

EasyView hasn’t officially been killed off, but it’s much more difficult to find. For a product aimed at people counting every rand, that’s not good news .

EasyView has been around since February 2008 and is DStv’s cheapest satellite package. It carries free-to-air channels, with the added benefit of digital broadcast quality through a decoder.

That R30 price point is important. The next-lowest DStv Access option costs R99 a month for streaming, with the satellite version at R150 a month. That may still sound “budget”, but for someone who’s unemployed or living in a household where groceries, transport, and electricity are already fighting for space, R30 to R99 or R150 is not a small jump. It is the difference between “we can manage” and “never mind”.

Khehla Ngekazi, an EasyView subscriber, told /explain/ he chose the package for one simple reason: affordability. “It’s helping me a lot because I watch what I pay for and enjoy without stressing,” he said.

He said he was disappointed to learn EasyView was no longer visible on the DStv website, because he is unemployed and it is the most affordable package for him.

Another EasyView subscriber, Laina Kentshane, said she had been using the package “for a long time” because it is the cheapest. “I am unemployed so I can watch soapies, and news and it’s not that expensive,” she told /explain/.

Kentshane said she did not know EasyView was no longer displayed on the website until /explain/ asked her about it. If the package became more difficult to access or disappeared, she said, the impact on her household would be “very bad”.

But there is another side to this. DStv installer Anthony Plesier told /explain/ that, in his experience, very few customers actually choose EasyView. “People don’t subscribe to that package because they get [only] a few channels,” he said.

He said most of his clients prefer DStv Access or Family because they offer more content. His view is that DStv is not necessarily abandoning low-income viewers, because it still offers cheaper packages, including Access.

That is a fair point: a low price does not automatically mean high demand. Sometimes people would rather pay more if the cheaper option feels too limited. But the issue here is not only about EasyView’s popularity. It’s whether low-income customers can easily find the cheapest option if they want it.

The EasyView change is happening as DStv’s new owner, Canal+, tries to simplify and reshape MultiChoice after its takeover. Reuters reported in January 2026 that Canal+ expected major savings from the MultiChoice deal, including more than €150 million in annual savings in 2026 and up to €400 million from 2030.

Canal+ has also been open about wanting to simplify DStv’s complex package structure. Moneyweb reported in April 2026 that Canal+ saw DStv’s many offers, add-ons, and pricing points as too complex.

In business language, this is called streamlining. In simple language, it means the company is cleaning up the menu and the cheapest item may no longer be on the front page.

That does not automatically mean DStv is turning its back on low-income viewers. But removing the cheapest package from the main website raises an awkward question: if people do not already know EasyView exists, how are they supposed to ask for it?

This comes at a tough time for households. According to Statistics South Africa. consumer inflation jumped to 4% in April 2026, driven mainly by fuel-price increases. And Nedbank has previously noted that satellite TV subscriptions can raise affordability concerns, particularly as streaming gives consumers more alternatives and more control over what they pay for.

But streaming is not automatically the answer for everyone. It needs data, a device, and reliable internet. For lower-income households, satellite TV can still be simpler: pay the subscription fee, use the decoder, and watch the channels.

That is why EasyView’s visibility matters. It may not be glamorous or packed with channels, but for some viewers, it is the difference between having access to news, soapies, and basic entertainment or being priced out entirely.

For now, Canal+ says EasyView is still available through WhatsApp and DStv’s call centre. That is good news for people who already know where to look.

But for everyone else, the cheapest DStv package has become a bit like a secret menu item. And when the people who need it most are also the ones most likely to watch their spending closely, that’s not a website-design choice: it’s an access issue.