Just over one year after launching, Disney’s flagship streaming service Disney+ has 86.8 million paying subscribers as of Dec. 2. CEO Bob Chapek said the platform has “exceeded our wildest expectations.”
Disney (DIS) also shared the numbers for its other two streaming platforms: Hulu has 38.8 million subscribers, and ESPN+ has 11.5 million.
That’s 137 million paying subscriptions across Disney’s streaming products, and the company got there in just over two years. (ESPN+ launched in April 2018; Disney+ launched in November 2019; and Disney took full control of Hulu in May 2019 after an agreement with Comcast.)
That puts Disney right on the heels of Netflix and Amazon in streaming. Netflix has 195 million global subscribers, with 73 million of them in the U.S. Amazon Prime has 150 million subscribers, but doesn’t break out Prime Video subscribers, and some estimates say just 30 million Prime subscribers watch Prime Video.
Amid the wild success of its “Star Wars” original series “The Mandalorian,” Disney’s new head of content distribution Kareem Daniel shared that “in the next few years,” Disney will release 10 new original Marvel shows, 10 new original “Star Wars” shows, and 15 new Disney Animation or Pixar shows, all to Disney+.
Disney has gone all in on streaming in the past two years.
In October, the company announced a major corporate re-org to put more emphasis on its direct-to-consumer platforms and push more original content to them. Last month, Disney reported a loss of $710 million for Q4 and a loss of $2.83 billion for its fiscal 2020 overall. Its stock rose 6% the next day anyway, mostly on the news that Disney+ had amassed 73.7 million subscribers.
It was proof that Disney’s streaming efforts are enough to save the stock amid bad news about every other division due to the pandemic, and that Disney shareholders are buying into the new and publicly stated streaming-first direction of the company.
In light of its huge streaming gains, Disney on Thursday revised its subscriber guidance for Disney+ to a range of 230 million to 260 million globally by the end of 2024 (up from guidance of 60 million to 90 million given in April 2019), and 300 million to 350 million subscriptions across all of its streaming services.
—
Daniel Roberts is an editor-at-large at Yahoo Finance and closely covers Disney and the streaming wars. Follow him on Twitter at @readDanwrite.
Read more:
What ‘Queen’s Gambit’ and ‘Mandalorian’ say about Netflix vs Disney original content strategies
Disney+ now has the power to save Disney stock from bad earnings reports
Disney's big streaming re-org is not just about Disney+
Disney, WB are sending a clear signal: Americans aren't ready to return to movie theaters
Disney’s $30 ‘Mulan’ plan will be a litmus test for the entire film industry
Disney's 'Mulan' will look to Christopher Nolan's 'Tenet' for a movie theater health check
Coronavirus is forcing Quibi, NBC Peacock to change their plans at launch
Movie theaters seek bailout as coronavirus devastates business