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Yeah, yeah, there’s plenty of talk about free ad-supported streaming. But we still love to see the number of subscribers that the major subscription streaming players are bringing in quarter after quarter.
After this quarter’s earnings season, we collected the last reported subscriber figures of 2022 to see how major streamers stack up ahead of 2023. Here’s our rundown:
- Netflix ended its final quarter without an ad-supported tier with roughly 223 million global subscribers, the first time this fiscal year in which the streaming giant reported subscriber growth.
- Disney+, which is readying its own ad-supported tier for next month, counted 164 million global subscribers, an increase of more than 12 million from the prior quarter.
- Warner Bros. Discovery, which operates streamers including HBO Max and Discovery+, ended the quarter with nearly 95 million total streaming subscribers—but the company has stopped breaking out HBO Max and Discovery+ subscribers separately. (With that said, it’s likely the majority of those subs are from HBO and HBO Max, based on figures released earlier this year.)
- Hulu, the highest revenue-per-user streamer in Disney’s portfolio, ended the quarter with 47.2 million total subscribers, which includes subscribers to its Live TV offering.
- Paramount+ is gaining on Hulu, reaching 46 million total subscribers in the quarter, and Paramount’s entire streaming portfolio (which includes Paramount+ as well as Showtime, Noggin, and BET+) neared 67 million global subs.
- ESPN+, another Disney-owned streamer, reported 24.3 million total subscribers.
- Peacock ended the quarter with “more than 15 million highly engaged paid subscribers,” as well as 14 million free users or users who receive Peacock as part of a bundle, Comcast chairman and CEO Brian Roberts said.
Look, over there! But streaming companies don’t appear to be so keen on highlighting streaming subscription size and are trying to shift the focus on other figures, like revenue and profit, due to Wall Street pressures.—KS