Most people choose a news subscription on the journalism and discover the account limit later, usually when a second person tries to read something on their own phone and gets bounced to a sign-in screen. The number of accounts is the quiet part of the offer, and it is the part that decides whether one subscription serves a household or becomes a small daily argument. The digital subscription range sets that number at one, three or five.
Count the Readers Before the Features
- Who actually reads it. Not who might, but who opens a paper in a normal week.
- On how many devices. A phone, a tablet and a laptop belonging to one person still count as one reader.
- Whether they read at the same time. Simultaneous use is where a single account shows its limit fastest.
- Whether the extras matter to them. Someone who only reads the front page needs less than someone who wants the magazines.
Answer those four honestly and the tier usually picks itself. Households tend to overestimate the first question and underestimate the third.
What Every Account Carries
Whichever tier a household lands on, the base is the same: every article on the site and in the app, the ability to comment under them, the subscriber newsletters, and the loyalty programme that sits alongside the reading. Nobody is reading a thinner newspaper because they are on the entry tier.
That matters more than it sounds. On plenty of news offers the entry tier is a cut-down paper with articles held back. Here the difference between tiers is reach rather than access, which makes the account count the honest thing to compare. Any press subscription is worth reading that way round.
What You Are Choosing Between
Three tiers and two features that come with all of them, from the current subscription offer.
Access, One Account
A single reader, signed in on their own devices. It carries the full article archive, commenting and the newsletters, so a solo subscriber gives up nothing on the journalism itself. The ceiling is simply that the account belongs to one person, so a partner reading over a shoulder is the only sharing on offer.
Premium, Three Accounts
The household tier. Three separate sign-ins mean three reading histories and no handing a password around. It also opens the newspaper and the magazines in digital form in the evening, the journalists’ own letters, and the cooking and games apps, which tend to be what pulls in the household members who would not otherwise open a news app.
Premium+, Five Accounts
Five accounts covers a larger family or a household where adult children still read on the same subscription. On top of the accounts it adds the magazine library, which is the other reason people move up rather than the headcount alone. Two readers who both want the magazines can end up here before a family of four does.
The Subscriber Newsletters
Included at every tier, and the part that turns a subscription into a habit. They arrive whether or not anyone remembers to open the app, which is usually what keeps a second or third reader engaged past the first month rather than quietly abandoning the account.
The Privileges Loyalty Programme
Also at every tier. It sits outside the reading itself and rewards staying subscribed, so on a multi-account plan it applies to the household rather than to whoever happened to sign up.
Sizing It Up
Start from the headcount, not the feature list. One reader is one reader however many devices they own, and paying for five accounts to serve two people is the most common way to overspend on a newspaper. If the honest answer is two, the three-account tier is the one with room to spare rather than the one with waste in it.
Then check whether the extra readers want the same things. A household where one person reads politics and another reads the magazines is better served moving up a tier than buying two separate subscriptions, and a shared news subscription is simpler to run than two of anything.
Offers and tier contents shift, so confirm what is current when you subscribe. The subscriptions described here are sold by Le Figaro. More reading on media and lifestyle goes up at Thevougeclub.
