Meta slashes EU Facebook and Instagram subscription fees by 40% to meet regional regulatory demands
This picture taken on April 27, 2023 in Toulouse, southwestern France, shows a screen displaying the Meta logo and the European flag.
Lionel Bonaventure | Afp | Getty Images
Meta cut the price of its ad-free subscription versions of Facebook and Instagram by 40% for European Union users to comply with regulatory demands in the region.
The social media company will also offer EU users access to Facebook and Instagram for free if they agree to be shown ads based on a limited set of user data, the company said in a Tuesday blog.
Meta originally debuted an ad-free subscription service for the EU in October 2023 due to an EU regulation intended to clamp down on anti-competitive practices by tech companies. The subscription service also came into effect after regional regulators fined the company over $400 million for violating EU data privacy laws.
“The changes we’re announcing today meet EU regulator demands and go beyond what’s required by EU law,” Meta President Nick Clegg said Tuesday on Threads.
The company said it will drop the price of its EU monthly subscription service from 9.99 euros to 5.99 euros for desktop users and from 12.99 euros to 7.99 euros for iOS and Android users.
If EU users choose the “less personalized option” to access Facebook and Instagram for free, they will see ads that “may be less relevant to a person’s interests,” the company said. For this version, Meta said it will show ads based on “a minimal set of data points,” including users’ age, gender, location and how they engage with ads.
Additionally, EU users who choose the free option will also see unskippable ads that are intended to “provide value to advertisers,” Meta said.
The EU’s tough regulations have impacted Meta’s ability to quickly debut new services in the region compared to less-regulated areas like the U.S. In 2023, for instance, it took nearly half a year before Meta was able to offer its Twitter-like Threads service to European users after it launched in the U.S. that summer.
Pedro Pavón, a Meta global policy director, said that while EU regulators make it difficult for online-advertising based companies to operate in the region, he believes that business practice of offering personalized ads represents the “the foundation of a modern, free internet” and lets people “connect with the brands and products most relevant to them in seamless and non-disruptive ways.”
“This is why I expect that even when presented with several equal choices, most people will still choose our personalized ads service,” Pavón said in a LinkedIn post said.
Firefly’s CEO Jason Kim reacts during the company’s IPO at the Nasdaq MarketSite in New York City, U.S., August 7, 2025.
Jeenah Moon | Reuters
Last week’s liftoff also coincided with President Donald Trump‘s “space superiority” executive order, signed on Friday, that aims to create a permanent U.S. base on the moon.
Investors have also gained more clarity on the future of NASA following a whirlwind drama since Trump won the election.
Last week, the Senate confirmed Jared Isaacman as NASA administrator more than a year after he was first nominated to the position.
Trump withdrew the nomination from the Elon Musk ally earlier this year amid a public fallout, but renominated Isaacman in November.
Transportation Secretary Sean Duffy was tapped to temporarily run the space agency in the interim.
Google parent Alphabet on Monday announced it will acquire Intersect, a data center and energy infrastructure company, for $4.75 billion in cash in addition to the assumption of debt.
Alphabet said Intersect’s operations will remain independent, but that the acquisition will help bring more data center and generation capacity online faster.
In recent years, Google has been embroiled in a fierce competition with artificial intelligence rivals, namely OpenAI, which kick-started the generative AI boom with the launch of its ChatGPT chatbot in 2022. OpenAI has made more than $1.4 trillion of infrastructure commitments to build out the data centers it needs to meet growing demand for its technology.
With its acquisition of Intersect, Google is looking to keep up.
“Intersect will help us expand capacity, operate more nimbly in building new power generation in lockstep with new data center load, and reimagine energy solutions to drive US innovation and leadership,” Sundar Pichai, CEO of Google and Alphabet, said in a statement.
Google already had a minority stake in Intersect from a funding round that was announced last December. In a release at the time, Intersect said its strategic partnership with Google and TPG Rise Climate aimed to develop gigawatts of data center capacity across the U.S., including a $20 billion investment in renewable power infrastructure by the end of the decade.
Alphabet said Monday that Intersect will work closely with Google’s technical infrastructure team, including on the companies’ co-located power site and data center in Haskell County, Texas. Google previously announced a $40 billion investment in Texas through 2027, which includes new data center campuses in the state’s Haskell and Armstrong counties.
Intersect’s operating and in-development assets in California and its existing operating assets in Texas are not part of the acquisition, Alphabet said. Intersect’s existing investors including TPG Rise Climate, Climate Adaptive Infrastructure and Greenbelt Capital Partners will support those assets, and they will continue to operate as an independent company.
Alphabet’s acquisition of Intersect is expected to close in the first half of 2026, but it is still subject to customary closing conditions.
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