Microsoft reportedly capped Xbox's cloud gaming service to 15 hours due to operating costs

Microsoft

The 15-hour monthly cap Microsoft is placing on Xbox Cloud Gaming for Game Pass Ultimate subscribers is not an arbitrary number — according to reports, it corresponds precisely to the point at which cloud streaming becomes a net loss for the company. Beyond that threshold, each hour of cloud play costs Microsoft more than it recovers from the subscription fee.

The details:

As reported by Windows Central, industry analysts connects the cap to Azure capacity pressures driven by Microsoft's AI investments. Server memory resources across Azure are increasingly being redirected toward AI workloads, squeezing the headroom available for cloud gaming infrastructure and raising the cost per session.
Microsoft has said the cap will affect around 4% of Game Pass subscribers when it takes effect in November — but 4% of a user base in the tens of millions still amounts to over a million players who will hit the ceiling regularly, and those tend to be the service's most engaged users.

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