I have a bad feeling about the future of Google One prices

Google One used to be a suite of subscription services primarily centered around cloud storage. When that dreaded “Account storage is full” notification popped up on my devices, I had to decide whether I wanted to spend my day clearing out my Gmail and Drive or pay up for Google One Basic or Premium. Google added additional perks to One subscriptions over time, such as Google Store rewards and VPN access.

Storage remained the centerpiece until one year ago, when Google launched its AI Pro and AI Ultra subscriptions.

The new tiers put greater emphasis on exclusive AI perks, leaving me skeptical. I couldn’t justify paying for the old Google One Premium plan, so why would I pay double for the Google AI Pro subscription with its unconvincing AI features? For a while, Google didn’t give me a reason to. That all changed with a big addition last October, and it was the start of a new trend. Google AI Pro is now one of the best deals in subscriptions you’ll find anywhere on the internet, but for some reason, that leaves me more scared than excited.

Google One was an imperfect subscription service for most of its life because, contrary to its name, it wasn’t the “one” Google software product to rule them all. Extra cloud storage was basically the sole reason to subscribe to Google One. Google users who needed other benefits had to subscribe individually to Nest Aware, YouTube Premium, or Fitbit Premium, and that’s without mentioning other subscriptions like Google Play Pass or YouTube TV. The disjointed subscription offerings were partly a testament to Google’s diverse range of services — how could it fit everything into a single plan without charging users a fortune?

Google began answering that question in October 2025, when it added Google Home Premium Standard to the AI Pro plan without raising the price. For those out of the loop, Home Premium is the successor to Nest Aware, which is vital for extended video history and other smart home features. Home Premium Standard costs $9.99 monthly on its own, but it’s bundled with AI Pro for only $19.99 total.

Imagine my surprise when I watched the Google I/O 2026 keynote this week and saw that yet another subscription is being added to Google AI Pro. This time, it’s YouTube Premium Lite — a subscription that usually costs $8.99 on its own and offers an ad-free experience for most videos. I’ve suffered through watching YouTube ads for years, and my frustration never pushed me to pay for Premium. Now, as a Google AI Pro subscriber, I don’t have to.

I began paying $20 monthly for 2TB of cloud storage and Home Premium Standard, with the expanded Gemini rate limits (which I’d use occasionally) available as an added perk. Who would’ve thought that half a year later, the same $20 would get me 5TB of cloud storage, Home Premium Standard, Health Premium, YouTube Premium Lite, and even more Google AI feature access?

It almost sounds too good to be true… so is it?

The overwhelming suite of Google AI Pro services included as of this month has me frantically checking my math. Google One Premium’s 2TB storage tier used to be $9.99 on its own. Previously, Gemini Advanced and Google AI Premium added higher rate limits and early feature access to the 2TB of cloud storage for $19.99 monthly — that plan was later rebranded as the AI Pro tier we have today. Google Home Premium Standard and Google Health Premium will each cost $9.99 per month. YouTube Premium Lite costs $8.99 monthly on top of that.

After doing some napkin math, it’s not a stretch to estimate that the Google AI Pro subscription provides around $50 in monthly value despite its $20 monthly cost. Google is a for-profit company, so you have to wonder whether that arrangement is sustainable in the long run.

AI Pro’s extra features seem even more suspicious, given the wider state of Google subscriptions. Just last month, Google hiked YouTube Premium prices. This month, Google’s switch from Fitbit Premium to Health Premium made the annual subscription $20 more expensive. Individual subscriptions are going up in price while the unified AI Pro subscription continues to gain perks at the same $19.99 price point, and it doesn’t seem to add up.

Subscriptions always seem to be rising in cost, and bundles aren’t immune. When Apple launched Apple One Premier in 2020, the unified subscription plan cost $29.95 per month. Nearly six years later, the same plan costs $37.95 per month. There’s nothing guaranteeing Google AI Pro will stay at $19.99 per month forever, and signs point to the opposite.

The skeptic in me wonders if that’s the goal — use the attractive AI Pro subscription price to get people to try more Google services and hope they won’t leave if the cost goes up.

While there’s nothing guaranteeing the AI Pro price will stay the same, there’s nothing guaranteeing it won’t either. Given other subscription services, it seems like a matter of when, not if, Google AI Pro will rise in cost.

I’d be lying if I said I wasn’t spooked about all AI Pro currently offers for $19.99 per month. The newfound benefits sound like music to my ears today, but I wouldn’t be surprised if Google ends up making us pay for them tomorrow.