Google Fiber drops 1 Gbps service to $55/month in San Antonio, adds YouTube TV option

Google Fiber is cutting $15 from the monthly cost of its 1 Gbps fiber internet service as it launches service in San Antonio, Texas. The company is also offering its streaming YouTube TV service for free for 14 days to those who sign up—a noteworthy action considering the company last month said it would not sell its standard TV services with its Fiber launches in Louisville, Kentucky, and San Antonio.

A Google Fiber representative said the company doesn't have any plans to lower pricing in its other, existing markets. Based on a cursory check of Google Fiber’s other cities, the company continues to charge the $70-per-month price it initially started with.

Related: Industry Voices—Sachs: The rumors of Google Fiber’s death have been greatly exaggerated

Google announced the $55 price in a post to its website yesterday. “In San Antonio, we’ve priced our Fiber 1000 (1,000 mbps) service at $55 per month. There’s no installation fee, no hidden fees, no contracts, and no data caps. Just super fast Internet service for less than the speed limit on I-35,” Tyler Wallis, Google Fiber’s San Antonio City Manager, wrote on the Google Fiber blog. Wallis did not say whether the price was an introductory or temporary action.

According to a Google Fiber customer service representative, Google Fiber is also offering 14 days of free access to its new YouTube TV streaming TV service, which collects a handful of broadcast and cable channels and distributes them over the internet. After 14 days, the price rises to the standard $35-per-month fee that YouTube TV goes for to non-Google Fiber customers.

And to further sweeten the deal in San Antonio, Google Fiber is offering a free Nvidia Sheild TV streaming device and a free Google WiFi router—both of those free offers require Google Fiber customers to keep their service for a year.

The price reduction is notable for Google Fiber as its initial $70 price essentially set nationwide pricing expectations for 1 Gbps services. The move also comes just weeks after Google Fiber’s wireless leader, Charles Barr, left the company, marking the latest in a string of executives to leave the internet search giant’s broadband venture management team.

Though much has been written about Google Fiber, parent company Alphabet in recent quarters has dramatically scaled back spending in its Google Fiber business division. And, as DSLReports noted, most Google Fiber customers estimates hover around 100,000—well below initial corporate expectations.

Article updated Nov. 15 with commentary from Google.