Not just Spotify, Vodafone grabs Stan for its subscribers too

Australians now have quite a few choices when it comes to streaming media, but if you’re a Vodafone customer, you now have a choice between audio and video.

Vodafone has announced that its partnership with Fairfax’s streaming media service Stan will deliver a three month subscription for free to existing Vodafone Red subscribers, with more possibly coming to new customers, offering video to go with a mobile plan.

“We are excited to bring Vodafone Red customers a three month subscription to the biggest deal in entertainment, and it’s on us,” said Stephen Smyth, General Manager of Postpaid at Vodafone.

“With the biggest library of content on an SVOD platform in Australia, and an exciting line-up of exclusive new shows, Stan is inviting Australians to discover new, exciting content.”

Stan will join Spotify as one of the free subscriptions Vodafone offers to its subscribers, with subscribers to the $70 and $80 Red plan able to grab a six month subscription to Stan, while the $100 Red plan customers can grab a full year of Stan.

One thing of note is how data will be charged, and it’s not unmetered here, so if you watch Stan on your Vodafone connected smartphone, it will be charged as regular data. As such, Vodafone suggests that an hour of high definition video will likely consume close to 3GB, but standard definition — which should be fine for a phone — could run at a little over a gigabyte per hour, with a lower resolution able to bring that down to half a gig per hour.

That said, Vodafone is including bonus data for the $80 and $100 plans for the next two years, raising it 2GB and 4GB per month respectively.

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“We expect customers will welcome the ability to transform their “dead time” – their lunch breaks and commutes — by snacking on their favourite TV shows and movies throughout the day, and using their traditional “TV time” at home to binge-watch,” said Smyth. “It’s an exciting proposition, and one we’re thrilled to bring to Vodafone customers.”

From what we can tell, Vodafone’s inclusion of Stan comes as a choice, with subscribers able to choose whether they want access to one of the free service subscriptions, but not all. As such, this will mean that if you sign up to a Vodafone Red plan, you’ll get a choice of Spotify, Stan, or a subscription to the Sydney Morning Herald, but not all three.

That said, we’ve checked with Vodafone, and if you have already previously subscribed to Vodafone’s Red with Spotify, you’ll still get three months of free Stan, with the service continuing past the three month mark at $10 per month.