Say Hello to the Unsubscribe Olympics and the Resolution Economy

The digital economy has a seasonal rhythm. Late December is when consumers “zero out” recurring payments — a thumb-scroll through bank apps and email receipts. If it auto-renews, it’s on trial.

In CNET’s annual subscription survey (with YouGov), Americans said they spend about $90 a month — roughly $1,080 a year — on subscriptions. About $17 a month (around $205 a year) goes to services that are rarely or never used. Sixty-one percent said economic concerns are making them reconsider at least one subscription, and 25% had already canceled a paid service. No surprise, then, that “subscription management” is becoming a product category, not just a personal habit.

What gets cut first is anything that feels like a background process rather than a deliberate choice: the extra streamer added for one show, the premium app tier used for a week, the meal kit that stopped saving time or the gym membership that became aspirational overhead. Streaming shows how normalized “rotation” has become: Ampere Analysis found nearly one-third of U.S. streaming sign-ups occur between November and January, but price remains a key churn driver.

Platforms respond by treating cancellations as temporary. Antenna has emphasized rising resubscription behavior, and data shared with Business Insider suggested 61% of Netflix subscribers who canceled in 2023 returned within a year — the subscription economy’s new social contract: leave when you want, come back for the next hit.

Consumers still cram cancellations into the end of the year because “easy to sign up” doesn’t always mean “easy to cancel.” The Federal Trade Commission (FTC) finalized a “click-to-cancel” rule in October 2024 aimed at making cancellations as simple as sign-ups, but a U.S. appeals court blocked the rule in July. So, the December purge remains a minor endurance sport of passwords, chatbots, and “are you sure?” screens.

Then January flips the script. The money saved by deleting defaults tends to get redirected toward “new year, new me” spending — a pattern behavioral economists call the “fresh start effect,” where temporal landmarks like New Year’s Day motivate aspirational behavior.

Gift cards are the fastest bridge from holiday to January retail. Cardlytics has reported that gift-card shoppers spend beyond the value of their cards when redeeming — about 40% more on average (roughly $59). Capital One Shopping research likewise finds 61% of consumers spend more than their card’s value when they redeem. Retail strategists also note that January campaigns often position gift cards as a “treat yourself” budget, while leaning into resolution trends from wellness resets to Dry January or Veganuary.

Fitness is the other January headline, increasingly split between physical access and digital habit formation. Cardlytics’ transaction analysis shows traditional gyms still dominate fitness spend, but on-demand fitness subscriptions are growing fastest; it found that about half of consumers who start paying for an on-demand workout service in January are still paying through September, while gyms and studios lose most new customers over the same period.

And for consumers who want a “fresh start” somewhere warmer, January is also booking season. Reuters reported Royal Caribbean describing a record start to Wave season — the early-year promotional period when cruise companies drive reservations — with bookings holding steady but at higher prices.

The punchline is that consumers don’t stop spending after the holidays; they reallocate. December is about reclaiming control of recurring payments. January is about buying into a narrative of healthier, organized, more intentional. The brands that win will make both sides easy: transparent sign-up terms, clean cancellation and flexible pause options that match how people now treat subscriptions, which is less like commitments and more like settings.