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Stadia Pro is is going free for everyone for two months
It appears that Google is getting ready to open Stadia to a wider audience. The company announced today that new and existing users in 14 countries will get two months of Stadia Pro for free—and, more importantly, that anyone can sign up.
Stadia Pro normally goes for $10 per month and currently provides access to nine games: Destiny 2: The Collection, Grid, Gylt, Metro Exodus, Steamworld Dig 2, Steamworld Quest: Hand of Gilgamech, Thumper, the Serious Sam Collection, Spitlings, and Stacks on Stack (on Stacks). Pro subscribers can also play games in 4K if their internet connections can support it and 5.1 audio, while the free tier will be limited to 1080p and stereo audio.
Google didn't specify in which countries the Stadia Pro offer will be available, and no matter where you live, you may find that it's not actually available in your area just yet: The announcement says the rollout will take place "over the next 48 hours" and at this moment—about 1:30 pm ET on April 8—it's still not live, so you'll have to just keep trying until something happens, I guess.
The good news is that the "no commitment" policy holds: You can sign up, take advantage of the free months, and then quit. You'll lose access to the free games, but keep any that you've purchased on the platform.
Google also said that with so many more people now gaming from home, it will adopt a YouTube-like policy toward reducing Stadia bandwidth usage by temporarily reducing the default resolution from 4K to 1080p. Most people won't notice "a significant drop" in quality, but if you do you can apparently crank it back up to 4K in the Stadia app. It also warned that Stadia's support team is currently running at full capacity, so if you run into grief it recommends taking your best shot with the automated Help Center.
