The company now has 9.24m customers, with eight quarters left to meet its target of 10m subscribers by the end of 2010.
Sky said it saw a "significant opportunity" emerging in HD, after a sharp increase in demand over 2008. Between the third and fourth quarters of 2008, the number of customers taking Sky+ HD rose by 188,000 to 779,000.
The cost of the Sky+ HD box is being reduced from an average price of £150 in the second half of 2008; the installation fee is £30 and the HD content package is £9.75 per month.
Sky+ is also mushrooming with a 12.4% increase over the same period to 4.65m subscribers, while Sky Broadband subscribers rose by 9% to 1.96m.
The success in selling its customers the additional services was credited by the company for reducing annualised churn from 10.9% in the third quarter of 2008 to 9.9%, and increasing ARPU from £430 to a record £444.
Sky reported a pre-tax profit of £147m for the quarter ending December 31, up from a pre-tax loss of £157m in the same quarter in 2007. Revenues came in at £1.35bn, an increase of 6.2% year on year.
With the company increasing its interim dividend by 5% to 7.5p, its share price climbed 7% this morning to 466p as of 8.45am.
Income from TV consisted of £165m in ad revenues, down £2m year on year, and £93m in wholesale subscription revenues, up £5m year on year and benefiting from the return of Sky's basic channels to the Virgin Media platform in November.
Jeremy Darroch, chief executive, said: "In a very challenging economic environment, we have delivered a great set of results by focusing on quality, value and service for our customers ... We enter 2009 in a strong position."
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