The 2025–2026 Price Increase Landscape
A software price increase is no longer an occasional event to absorb — it is the default posture of every major vendor heading into 2026, and pushing back on it has become a core procurement discipline. The scale is unprecedented. Following Broadcom's acquisition of VMware, customers have reported increases ranging from 150% to over 1,500%, driven by the shift from perpetual licences to subscription and by a raised per-CPU core minimum that inflates the billable footprint regardless of actual use. Microsoft has confirmed a July 2026 Microsoft 365 increase touching virtually every SKU — from roughly +16.7% on Business Basic to +33% on Frontline F1 — and in November 2025 removed automatic volume-based discounts from Enterprise Agreements, quietly adding up to 12% for large estates at renewal. Oracle support fees continue their familiar 4–15% annual escalation, and ordinary SaaS contracts carry embedded uplifts of 5–10% a year.
| Vendor | 2025–2026 move | Reported impact |
|---|---|---|
| Broadcom / VMware | Perpetual to subscription; raised core minimum | 150% to 1,500%+ |
| Microsoft 365 | July 2026 SKU increases; volume discounts removed | +16.7% to +33%; up to +12% at EA renewal |
| Oracle | Annual support escalation; Java enforcement | 4–15% per year |
| Typical SaaS | Contractual annual uplift | 5–10% per year |
Why the Increases Are Landing Now
Three forces are converging. Vendors are converting perpetual estates to subscription to lift recurring revenue and reset the pricing baseline; private-equity and activist ownership is prioritising margin extraction from installed bases that are expensive to leave; and AI investment is being recovered through across-the-board list increases dressed up as platform enhancement. None of these is a reaction to your usage — which is exactly why the increase is negotiable. A price rise justified by the vendor's revenue strategy rather than by any change in the value you receive has no defensible floor, and that is the opening the buyer works.
The AI justification deserves particular scepticism. Vendors are recovering enormous model-training and infrastructure spend through list increases presented as platform enhancement, yet most enterprises use only a fraction of the AI features they are now being charged for. When a vendor attributes a double-digit increase to embedded AI, the correct response is to ask, in writing, which specific capabilities drive the increase, what adoption the vendor projects, and whether the AI component can be unbundled and priced separately. In the majority of cases the AI rationale evaporates under that scrutiny, because the increase was never really about AI — it was a baseline reset wearing a fashionable label.
The Clauses That Let It Happen
Most increases are not imposed despite your contract — they are permitted by it. The usual culprits are an uncapped annual uplift clause, an auto-renewal that rolls you onto current list pricing, and a support escalator pegged to the vendor's published rate rather than a fixed figure. Reading these before signing is the cheapest insurance available, which is why we treat the price-adjustment clause as a priority in our guide to reading a software contract. Where the clause already exists, the renewal is your chance to remove or cap it, and a credible replacement option is what gives that demand teeth.
The Pushback Playbook
Effective pushback follows a sequence. Begin with benchmark data: establish what comparable enterprises of your size and sector actually pay, because an increase looks very different when measured against market rates rather than the vendor's list. Our price benchmarking report exists for exactly this purpose. Next, separate the legitimate from the opportunistic — a CPI-linked adjustment of 2–3% is defensible; a 30% uplift attributed to vague platform value is not, and should be challenged line by line. Then introduce a credible alternative: a documented migration analysis or a competing written proposal, developed through a competitive bidding process, shifts the vendor from defending the increase to defending the account.
An increase the vendor cannot tie to a change in the value you receive has no floor. Make it justify the rise against benchmark data and a credible alternative, and the negotiable portion appears.
Sequence the levers deliberately. Present benchmark and utilisation data first to establish the factual baseline; introduce the competitive alternative only after the vendor's initial response, so it reads as a considered escalation rather than an opening bluff. The same discipline that defuses a routine SaaS uplift defuses a structural repricing — buyers who modelled a credible migration have blunted even the Broadcom VMware and Microsoft increases that looked non-negotiable on paper.
Caps, Locks and Co-Terms
Winning this year's argument is worth little if next year's increase is already baked in, so convert every concession into a structural protection. Negotiate a hard cap on annual uplifts — a fixed 3% or CPI, whichever is lower, is a reasonable target — and a multi-year price lock that fixes unit pricing for the full term rather than just year one. Remove auto-renewal onto list pricing and replace it with renewal at the locked rate. Co-terminate disparate agreements so the whole estate comes up for negotiation together, multiplying your leverage rather than letting the vendor pick you off one renewal at a time. Pair maintenance reductions with the price-lock work using the approach in our guide to negotiating software maintenance reductions.
Co-termination is worth dwelling on because the arithmetic is so favourable. An enterprise with five separate agreements renewing on five different dates negotiates from weakness five times a year, each time facing a vendor who knows the others are not in play. Align those renewals to a single date and the same enterprise negotiates once, from the strength of a consolidated commitment the vendor cannot afford to lose. The consolidation itself often unlocks a better discount tier, and it converts a series of defensive, deadline-driven conversations into one planned, offensive negotiation. Achieving it usually requires short bridging extensions on one or two agreements, a small price for the structural advantage it buys.
When to Walk and How to Signal It
Sometimes the increase is genuinely indefensible and the right answer is to leave — but the threat only works if it is real. Quantify the switching cost, secure an internal sponsor, and let the documentation rather than the rhetoric carry the message. A vendor that watches you move even 10% of an estate reprices the rest very differently from one hearing a complaint. To pressure-test an increase against benchmark data, or to run the pushback on your behalf, request a confidential briefing.