XM pricing-What is the monthly promo with fees?

[MotorCityRadioFreak]

Seems like it is now impossible to pay ahead for the year for XM. They are offering plans for $4.99 per month for 12 months.I would much rather pay up front and be done with it. I was never able to get a straightforward answer to the amount per month after fees. After royalty fees, what is the cost per month?

[MWmetalhead]

I'm paying $6.06 a month inclusive of taxes and fees.

Your price most likely would be identical to mine.

[Turkeytop]

I first signed up for Sirius in 2005 before the merger with XM. At that time they were offering a lifetime subscription for $500. I sometimes wish I had signed up for that.

[MWmetalhead]

Here's what "lifetime subscription" actually meant:
https://siriusbuzz.com/what-happens-wit ... iption.php

However, in 2021, a class action lawsuit resulted in a settlement whereby the company agreed to treat lifetime subscriptions as true lifetime subscriptions - meaning the lifetime subscription now follows the consumer who purchased it from device to device:
https://www.insideradio.com/free/nearly ... 6c9e6.html

I never purchased a lifetime subscription, but I bought a standalone Sirius tuner (which plugs into a receiver using RCA plugs) in late 2004, if I remember correctly. A tabletop square-shaped plastic antenna with a long cord plugs into the standalone tuner. Long after I moved my active account / subscription to another device, the standalone Sirius tuner continued to receive all channels it was capable of receiving!

The last time I cracked out that unit to see if was functional was 2016, and it still worked great! Picked up every single channel it could receive in the clear. I had no need for it, and was moving to a new house, so I ultimately threw it away.

Indoor reception of Sirius became much better once they launched a geostationary satellite to supplement their two orbiting satellites. With that tabletop tuner, I always used to lose steady reception twice daily for a couple hours each time prior to the geostationary satellite being launched. Once that new bird was in the sky, all I needed to do was aim the face of the antenna to the SW, and I could get perfect reception 24/7. Signal meter always had 2 of 3 bars lit.

XM, I believe, used geostationary satellites from day one. An old Yamaha home theater receiver had a jack to plug in a slightly larger than postage-stamp sized XM adapter, which had to be purchased separately. A tabletop antenna than plugged directly into the adapter. My XM signal strength indoors, if I aimed the antenna in the optimal direction, ranged between 45% and 50% (using whatever scale the receiver used). If the signal strength meter dropped below 40%, that's when dropouts would generally start to occur.

For about a decade, all of my SXM listening indoors has been via WiFi sent straight to my home theater receiver or via smart TV app.

[Taco]

I cancelled via chat today. It took a bit longer this time. First they offered the same package I had for $5.99/month and I declined and then they offered $3.99/month and told them I'm using Apple Music now and don't need two music services. Then they finally cancelled me.