Who's Winning the Streaming Wars? (2022 Edition) 

Every production house having its own streaming service is not a viable business model

I don't think I'd count Prime as anywhere close to Netflix, simply because the vast majority of people with Prime do it just for the fast Amazon shipping.

We can all laugh at the The Streaming War, but the collateral is tons of brilliant iconic IP being butchered by half-assed adaptations that will take a generation to salvage before they're presentable to the mainstream audience again. Looking at you especially Netflix.

Warner's new CEO's strategy would have been smart "10 years ago". He disregarded the fact that people who live in the now can find casual viewings for FREE and of more variety online. In my opinion, to outwardly announced that he would reduced the quality of production and go for quantity will reduced the value consumers find in Max streaming service.

Just like Disney is counting all ESPN and Hulu subscribers as Disney+ subscribers, Amazon is counting all Prime subscribers as Prime Video subscribers, isn't it?

Amazon Prime’s sports acquisitions were really smart. Sports and awards shows are still basically stuck on cable, so I’ve seen a ton of sports fans cutting the chord and getting a Prime subscription instead

What needs to be considered is that on the list the top players Netflix, Prime Video, Disney Plus and HBO Max are available in different parts of the world. While Hulu, Paramount plus and Peacock are only available in the US.

Torrents are winning the streaming wars👌🏻👍🏻

I was wondering the existence of Universal's streaming service. I think their downfall would be using their parent company's lesser-recognized peacock mascot as the front instead of the big name Universal to attract a wider audience in expecting the studio's portfolio.

Interestingly, In India, Disney+ is called as Disney+ HOTSTAR and it has content ranging from HULU to HBO MAX (GOT, HOTD, Succession etc is available in DISNEY+ HOTSTAR). So yes, it's a bit bizarre but we people get a lot of content to consume 😂

Disney+ "took the Crown away from Netflix" Nah, pretty sure Netflix still has that one 😆

One thing that was forgotten in this discussion is how much easier it is to just sign up for one month to any of these services to binge a show you like and then cancel. For cable (at least here) there are limitation for signing up and cancelling, i think there being a penalty of 3 months when you can't re-signup after a cancellation. It's a risky move, but i do see some of these services pulling something similar to stop people from jumping on and off.

I can't believe that in a video about streaming services he didn't talk about Nebula at the end, like he does with all the other videos. Lol. Great video though, I did enjoy it.

My opinion: nobody wins. And the golden age of streaming allows us to not mess around with "dubious websites" and pay a small fee to watch the contents. It was a win-win for both distributors and consumers. With the streaming war, the content is fragmented and the subscription costs get out of control. Eventually, the pirate will rule the seas again just before.

Shows like Succession and House of the Dragon are extremely good, top of the line content. I’d say HBO has the best content right now, it’d be really sad to see that change.

The Tolkien well is not dry; Amazon just shat in the bucket.

Great video guys! I love these sorts of subjects and personally have always been interested in the business side of the entertainment industry, especially streaming services.

One streaming service being slept on is Crunchyroll. The Funimation Crunchyroll merger changed the game. Crunchyroll now has a monopoly if not a massive share on anime and that genre only grows bigger abroad by the day.

the worst in the DACH region is, that due to random regional licensing and new emerging platforms the catalog is always changing, incomplete seasons spread over different platforms and often only providing the french or german version (in some cases even not having the original english version). It's just a mess, annoying and frustrating. Less and less worth the increasing fees.

there's really to many streaming services, it's got to the point where when a new show or movie comes out I just go straight my preferred pirate site cuz there's no way an average person can afford all of them. really its the new golden age of piracy

I think curiosity stream and nebula are the winners… in my heart if nothing else

Disney has an obligation to buy Comcast's share of Hulu and Comcast has an obligation to sell, so the default outcome is Disney ownership. That said, Peacock has been such a flop, Comcast may be interested in flipping the deal and buying out Disney's share instead. If so, I would see Peacock being the service merged into Hulu rather than the other way around.

So that's it then, we went away from cable so we could get all of our TV from one subscription. How haven't I realized years ago that one day there will be all this streaming services and we end up needing to pay for all of them to watch our favorite shows! Anyway, HBO Max, Apple TV+, and Prime Video each has shows that I really really enjoyed with Apple TV+ being the one with the most shows I enjoy from the moment I clicked play.

The video does not mention the most important fact about Hulu. Walt Disney owns an option to force Comcast to sell its 33% stake in 2024, and Comcast owns an option to force Disney to buy the 33% in 2024. Either company may exercise its respective option at that time, or both may decide then that the status quo is mutually beneficial and do nothing.

It would be interesting to know how many “prime video” subscribers actually use the service, I know a bunch of people who have prime for shipping, but never watch anything on prime, other than the odd show per year that they only watch as they have it.

The two issues I have with Netflix are that they are producing so many low-budget movies and shows whose qualities are not bad but seem so predictable and the other issue Is that Netflix keeps removing great shows like Malcolm In the Middle, Family Guy, Futurama, etc

I think the only reason amazon has so many subscribers is because prime shipping automatically comes with prime video so I dont think people actually watch much

Wouldn't it be stupid if Hulu were to be merged into Peacock? I think the better option would be to merge Peacock into Hulu as the Hulu branding is far more recognized and after that they can maybe launch in Europe too.

HBO canceling Westworld for their merge tells me all I need to know about this new 'Max' service.

All I ask is when you buy a property, you stay true to the core themes. Disney, Amazon, and most recently Netflix all did the complete opposite with their purchased properties and those shows flopped explicitly for that reason.

Pretty good summation of the year in streaming. A few thoughts. Netflix: Time to stop acting like Facebook and start performing like Microsoft. That subscriber loss wasn't materially big. It was big because Netflix convinced venture capitalists and banks that it was really a tech company. It's market capitalization (the money it can sweet talk out hedge fund managers) is like 50x compared to a movie studio like Disney that market cam at like 5x. The drop in subscribers was seen as peak saturation. And the money flow (based on the idea there were still more subscribers to be found) started to dry up. Netflix will spend most of the incoming year figuring out what business it wants to be. Most likely finding a few solid reliables the way Microsoft stopped chasing being the young upstart and settled on a reliable operating system and necessary apps. Disney: 2022 was a party, 2023 comes the hangover. This year Disney definitely won the streaming wars. And it broke the bank to do it. But that success is not sustainable. Disney will want those big budge production values back on the big screen earning them money. And making the equivalent of 4 Marvel movies, 6 Star Wars movies and 2-3 Pixar/Disney Animated movies on a platform that can't generate a tenth the revenue of worldwide theatrical releases will force Disney's hand. (There's a reason why the Disney Channel never attempted an HBO style success story) Disney will go where the money is and for this year and next at least, that will be back in theaters. HBO: Honestly, I wish we could just skip to the end of 2024, when Zaslav has stripped WB for parts and sold the rest to VCs. It's just painful to watch. It amazes me seeing how much devastation reality tv has laid across the TV landscape and believe the high priest to that is the right guy in an age of streaming. Background watching is meaningless if there are no ads underwriting it. If you aren't selling Chia Pets or Laundry detergent or anything this model does not work. Zaslav will go down as the boorish monster who wrecked prestigious studio. And he won't even have a big payday at the end because there are few who will want to buy WB for the third time as it circles the drain. Paramount / Peacock: These two are far enough down the list and desperate enough they may actually put some effort into the streaming wars. They might take a chance on someone with vision or try something outside the normal conventions and strike gold. Paramount can't keep hoping Star Trek will be as big as Star Wars. And Peacock can't keep thinking Friends is as big as it was 25 years ago. Crunchyroll: Though not as big as the other platforms here, I think it deserves a mention. Its young adult demographic will soon be the envy of the legacy streaming platforms. Legacy streamers will want to copy the success with a demo that will be more tech savvy and more engaged. I also think it's seasonal 13 week approach will be appealing to streamers done with the monthly grind. I don't know if anime is on the verge of new heights or has already peaked, but I suspect a lot of Crunchyroll's playbook will be adopted by the bigger players.

Honestly despite the hate I still feel Netflix is still the most worth the price. Every few months they have a great show that the whole world wants to watch

Not the consumer. That's for sure. We're basically back to cable TV, which explains the increase in piracy again. This is exactly what we hated about linear TV. Different packs for different channels, ads are back again on some subscription levels. It'll just be an endless cycle of greed -> piracy -> reinvention and rinse repeat

Apple TV+ is secretly turning into the best service of them all. Their offering is a steady stream of quality content with occasional masterpieces sprinkled on top, and the actual quality of their stream is way above anyone else (much higher bitrate and 4K Dolby Vision being a standard). All of that for one of the cheapest price points around.

I take issue with how Prime Video is always ranked toward the top of these lists, since it's bundled with Amazon Prime. I don't have data to back this up, but I suspect that the actual viewership numbers are significantly low, and that the subscriber count is misleading. Edit: There's some public data provided by Nielsen and SimilarWeb suggesting that Prime Video hovers around the viewership levels of Peacock and Paramount+ when measured by hours of viewing or app downloads.

The problem with Rings of Power is that it’s just simply not a good show.

Disney+ is very aggressively trying to get subscriptions in Germany. I got an offer for a 12 month auto-expiring free trial and accepted it a few months ago. Didn’t log in until now, but I was counted for sure.

The news about HBO I got from this video was actually sad. They are No1 on my appreciation list, with dearly loved shows such as The Wire, Boardwalk Empire, and more.

Can tell HBO Max is in trouble by the number of commercials recently to promote the channel and undo the bad publicity.

I once heard RU-vid is the only streaming service that is profitable. Would have been interesting in the comparison. Anyways a good video thank you guys, you do a great Job on all of your channels. Greetings from germany

Back around 2015/16 when I was training to be a Comcast home technician our trainer said, before the streaming wars, that "Everyone wants A la cart tv because they complain how high their bill is. Well they're going to get it but in the end be paying the same for less." It looks like he was right.

No matter who’s wining, we are losing

I dislike on Paramount + that if you buy no ads you still get ads that show previews of shows before each time you watch something. It’s making me reconsider purchasing it all year round

After a long time being a Netflix subscriber. I was ready to declare them dying, but then I discovered K-Drama. Nobody does K-Drama international better then them.

I suspect Amazon Prime Video is going to be more resilient due to it offering other usefull services from Amazon prime.

Excellent video! Great work! Very comprehensive and informative. And spot on that we are the losers here... so many streaming services that take us back to the cable TV days of paying tons of money. Want to watch the content we actually want? This show here, that show there... Solution? Families / friends sharing accounts. Only way to keep things reasonable... for as long as it lasts!

Only speaking for myself & a large group of my associates. When Netflix removed most of their Star Trek series & movies, it was a big mistake. Netflix deleted Star Trek, Trekkies deleted their Netflix accounts.

AppleTV+ has definitely been a sleeper hit, especially the family-friendly stuff.

I remember when you could flip on your over the air TV be spammed with the same number of commercials and pay nothing more.

Vought+ is the best I was moved by the story telling in Not Without My Dolphin ❤ Deep thought with The Deep is my favorite show. It is so insightful.

I think if one of these companies stops looking at this so much like a business tech situation and starts listening to consumers more they would be so much more successful. There are so many great good quality stuff that gets canceled because it doesn’t do as well, but it’s about playing the long game. If your platform has a greater percentage of that great quality stuff and if it doesn’t get canceled so often the platform as a whole ends up looking much better.

Watched the whole video call 'Who's winning the streaming wars?' only to be informed at the 18:58 mark that ' . . . we don't know who's winning'.

Who's winning? Why the sailors of course yarrg

Buying the disney+ subscription for the kids content is a waste of money when you can find Disney movies for a buck in any thrift store. This is how im building up my disney collection for my sons.

This is ten times worse than cable bundles back in the day. At least back then you could watch popular shows when they went into syndication without getting cable. But now you can magically lose tons of free content overnight to rival streaming services.

Crazy to hear how much some shows cost and yet we have writers and actors going on strike claiming they are not paid enough. Where is all the money going? Plus with many streaming services being unprofitable, something will have to give.

How many channels do we need? TLDR: Yes

Your forgetting that prime video viewership is based on people who have an Amazon prime account so they are also artificially inflating their numbers

There needs to be a Valve to reign in this industry like there was for gaming. Steam is the most pro-consumer monopoly out there.

RU-vid is beating all the streaming services and making way more money because they don’t spend nearly as much on content

The more increase in streaming wars, the more people will prefer piracy due to loss of shows from one platform to other or even just removed in the library.

Just as the majority of parties visiting Disneyland, throughout its history, have not contained children, the majority of households subscribing to Disney+, throughout its history, have also not contained children.

Remember when Netflix held the promise of being a one-stop for all things media, a repository of all past shows/movies and those yet to come? Now we are back to the cable subscription model again. Torrents are looking much more appealing again.

Netflix used to be great. I've had Netflix with two months but cancelled my subscription again. A whole lot of their content is foreign content with lipsynced audio or closed captioned content and the list of upcoming content is the same. In July 2022 I paid for 12 months of Disney+ but I'm kind of regretting that move too , but not as much as paying for Netflix for two months. I think all streaming services need to add the 12 month subscription with a discount like Disney+ does too.

You should have mentioned the combination between the streaming services of Paramount and Universal: "SkyShowtime".

Paramount+ growth and strong performance has come from their parent company's quite clear multi-platform strategy (Example: still running linear channels and licensing re-runs, offering Showtime on its own and the free Pluto TV service), expanding internationally (and that not clashing with its legacy businesses or its deals with foreign players like Sky/Canal+, but expanding upon those relationships). Stuff that others can learn and take notes on.

By the end of last year I stopped my Netflix account, and tried Apple TV+; which really delivers in "Quality not Quantity"!! - I'm NOT an Apple Fanboy- also added Amazon because it's very cheap!, and both services combined cost annually less than half of Netflix costs!! I thought I would miss Netflix, but I didn't!

The key is to have services remain connected rather than people binging then disconnecting until newer seasons air. Targeting kids programs, a demographic known for watching and rewatching shows multiple times (just ask any parent), would force parents to stay connected to the same service.

Netflix needs a Patreon page for fans to support favorite shows so they won't get cancelled midway through

People are ludicrous to pay $10/per month for multiple streaming services, when you can literally find any show or movie with a google search. Just saying

I think piracy is the actual one winning the Streaming Wars.

It's not a "war" it's good old fashioned competition. Which is good. War is bad.

Them treating their businesses as businesses is not all bad though, hopefully we'll see more focus on actual good storytelling and not just flashiness and pandering

Instead of merging Hulu into Peacock, why not merge Peacock into Hulu? Hulu is already there and successful. Peacock is atruggling to get noticed.

I think there should be an option to just rent one series or one movie from a streaming platform rather than a monthly subscription.

Sites that let people watch it all for free. That's who's winning. Everyone's tired of paying for overpriced content. $10-15 for each streaming service adds up to $100 pretty quick. It's a ridiculous concept that a whole day's wages should go to the chance of watching maybe 8 hours a month of content, assuming you're not a binge watcher and you actually have a full time job. $1 a month sounds fair per streaming service.

The biggest issue for Netflix is that they've poised themselves as "the streaming platform", but that's not something that will ensure them being relevant in the future. If you don't have actual content that's tied to you, people will not follow you. And their strategy of one- or two-season offs is not going to ensure them being interesting. That's the difference and biggest menace from Disney: Between nostalgia and strong content brands, they're the strongest contender and even if Disney+ isn't bigger now, they will at the end top them.

It’s actually surprising how hard these companies seem to be trying to get people to torrent the content instead of paying for them

It's always a good day when a new TLDR Business drops

Disney+ should completely merge Hulu into it’s service, because the service is not available in Europe and we miss a lot of decent content……

As someone who has suffered from subscription fatigue as I started collecting streaming services like candy - the pirate bay is now winning the streaming wars in my house 😂. Specifically, VPN, pirate bay, NAS storage and I'm done. For music its the same thing. If I really like a band I buy their physical product and similar for a tv show/movie. If I really like it I will actually buy the product. Other than that, its just huge corps trying to suck pennies from everyone.

And...we have cable TV once again. Can't wait for the subscription mega bundle and the different "channel choices" packages.

Disney+ is actually a really good deal here in Europe where we get all the hulu content as well as tons of great films from their buyout of fox

People laughed at me when I said cord-cutters were going to end up paying the same amount as they did with cable.

I've found the Apple TV+ content to be absolutely astounding. such great shows and not a bad value for money with their entire bundle. I feel confident that any show I start watching will be absolutely terrific

Disney and Apple have very little watchable content, so I cancelled both after one month. The free guys are better.

Rings of power was just terrible and it failed to gain interest from the audience. Stsr trek is brand that has died at the hands of the current producers. That built in audience has abandoned the current shows

The “streaming on demand” model itself is not sustainable. There are too many services trying to get a piece of the pie. The only legal winners will be cable and broadcast television, theatrical movies, and physical media such as blue ray and DVD.

Fantastic and informative video, guys. Nicely done.

The fact that there is so many now, it’s survival of the fittest! There’s some content that I use on Disney+ simply because of Star Was

I miss broadcast network TV. In its glory days, everyone watched the same shows and had a endless well of small talk. Streaming further fractures a fractured society. It builds on and encourages anti-social media bubbles of people that can't relate to other peopled outside their group.

I’m amused because at least in America as more and more households “cut the cord” on traditional cable TV complaining that the service was too expensive and considering half of the channels were not of interest. And wishing an Ale crate model was available. The industry started offering the “Streaming service” Which is how our family consumes TV

very interesting, thanks!! If we look like something like MUBI, they do not compete in terms of consumers nor revenue. Would you say they are struggling or do they just have their own niche and are they doing well in this? are they sustainable or is it difficult to continue their service? Do you have an analysis for on Mubi? thanks!!

In 20 years there will be LESS than 10 services that will collude as a handful (3-5) CABLE STREAMING companies. Expect the film industry to be resurrected by these streaming services NOT putting almost any films on their streaming services. If you want to watch a NEW movie it will be in theaters for the next 2-3 months.

I see Netflix and Disney heading downward, Hulu and Amazon unknown, HBO and Paramount going upward. At least in my immediate circle, HBO and Paramount are regarded as less “woke” than the others…also less content catered to women, which is oversaturated among the other platforms already. I think HBO is on the right track rebooting DC, and Paramount is carving out a niche with dads (Yellowstone, Top Gun, Seals, Star Trek, etc)

At last...my request is realized. It truly is one of the most disturbing & darkest endings of a horror movie I've ever seen.

ah yes, rings of power did poorly because lotr is not as relevant as they'd hoped and was a little too mined for content in the past no other reason why it could've possibly done badly

My VPN with Plex is winning! HBO has by far the best shows but Netflix has quantity and a lot of good foreign shows. Their US Netflix shows suck for the most part unfortunately.

I agree. It kind of sucks that you’re not gonna be spending as much money when you look at it that way, but I also think that there are some benefits there’s still so many streaming services. They’re still gonna be a tremendous amount of contact more than we’ve ever had before just maybe not as much relatively speaking as there is now. However, that will continue to grow because every year more and more shows and movies will come out. Also, I bet if it could also be that they will start to focus more on the last contact they have making it better because it’ll have to stand out more because there will be less content to bury lesser content, so equivalent of working out well either way the sheer amount of streaming services that I have I never have a problem finding something to watch it every year that they add hundreds of new shows and movies it’s just another year of stuff that I still have to play catch-up with

Older gamers will see exactly the same thing happening as what ended with the great MMO crash. Everyone wants to sell their subscription but people don't have money for all of them and the bubble will come crashing down. It's not IF but WHEN it will happen.