A subscription is not really a purchase of channels. It is a bet on the service being there, and behaving, for however long you have paid up front, and that is worth being clear about before you pay.
The pricing on every one of these is built to move you onto the longest term. The discount is real, and it is the price of taking the bet.
What I check now, in order.
What the shorter term costs, because that is the flexible option. On every service I have used it is a few dollars a month for the freedom to leave, and the channels are identical. You are paying for length, not a tier.
Whether the terms say anything about what happens if the service stops. Four friendly sentences with nothing about refunds or lineup changes is not a set of terms.
And how long the operation has existed, which is a thirty-second check and tells you what a year up front is actually betting on.
So I take a month first, always. The discount on a longer term is still there once I trust the service, and if I do not, I have lost a month rather than eleven.
The thing worth remembering: in a category where services do disappear, a long prepayment is a real bet, not a free saving.
How the plan lengths are structured, and what each one is for, is set out here.
The channels are the same on every plan. You are choosing a length, not a tier.