Streaming Year in Review

Streaming Media

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Two stories dominated streaming media in 2025: Netflix versus the rest and YouTube takes TV. YouTube may be the bigger story. “Netflix knows who its competition is,” said media guru Evan Shapiro at IBC25. “It’s YouTube.”

No-one was really surprised when YouTube CEO Neal Mohan declared, “YouTube is the new television.” That’s because the figures don’t lie. In his annual letter in February, Mohan revealed that TV screens have officially overtaken mobile as the “primary device for YouTube viewing in the US.”

The ‘new’ television doesn’t look like the ‘old’ television,” Mohan wrote. “It’s interactive and includes things like Shorts, podcasts, and live streams, right alongside sports, sitcoms and talk shows people already love.”

Noting that 45 million Americans watched election-related content on the platform, he unscored: “YouTube will remain the epicenter of culture.”

Already the largest internet TV provider in the US with more than 9 million subscribers, in May, YouTube held 12.5% of all TV use, according to Nielsen Guage, the highest share of TV for any streamer to date. Nielsen also noted that month that YouTube Main (excluding YouTube TV) is up over 120% since 2021 leading a collection of free services (such as PlutoTV, Roku Channel and Tubi) which have been “a major driver of streaming’s overall success”.

In July, in the UK, regulator Ofcom reported that YouTube was now the second most watched streaming service behind BBC iPlayer. Among 16 to 34 years olds YouTube was the most-watched service overall.

Alphabet’s video platform has become the indispensable distribution partner for studios and broadcasters. More and more of their content is being carried on YouTube with evidence to suggest that this does drive more viewers back to source – but this journey is not without a hitch.

Despite tapping new revenue from an ad-sales pact with YouTube and claiming views of its  content on the platform have leapt 169%, UK broadcaster Channel 4 warned of challenges working with social media networks.

“We have no control over third party platforms,” said Louisa Compton C4’s Head of News at the Edinburgh TV Festival in August. “The algorithms are shady and non-transparent. I also believe public service broadcasters content should be kite marked [given prominence] on those applications.”

Disney pulled its content from YouTube TV for two weeks November saying that YouTube was refusing to pay fair rates for its channel (YouTube claimed that Disney was using the blackout as a negotiating tactic that would have resulted in higher prices for its subscribers).

“Social media have the central ability to control the media experience of the audience,” said Kevin Mayer, co-founder and co-CEO of Candle Media at the RTS conference in September. His company owns CocoMelon, the largest family channel on YouTube with 200 million subscribers yet Mayer highlighted the vulnerability of relying on algorithms that could change overnight.

“YouTube is hard to deal with at times. Monetisation is lumpy. They tweak the algorithm. You have to be careful but the power and global nature of those platforms is undeniable.”

Nonetheless, 85% of Internet users watch YouTube each month with nearly one in five watching full-length movies and TV shows on the platform, charted Ampere Analysis. Significantly, it is 35–64-year-olds that is powering YouTube’s “golden age of film and TV,” according to Ampere.

Expect this to continue into 2026 with a “stronger emphasis on driving consumption on TV through licensed, long-tail movies and classic TV series,” predicts Jason Platt Zolov, Senior Consultant, Hub. “By packaging and promoting familiar titles in ways that appeal to audiences encountering them for the first time, YouTube is poised to extend its dominance beyond short-form and capture more living-room viewing.” 

Paramount Tops Netflix in Battle to Acquire WBD

In a bidding process in which Paramount Skydance was the pundits’ favorite, Netflix bid $82.7 billion (an equity value of $72 billion) for Warner Bros. Discovery’s streaming and studio business in early December and entered negotiations with the company.

Immediately following the Netflix bid, Warner Bros. Discovery shareholders rejected an upgraded offer from Paramount Skydance valuing the entire business at $108.4 billion. In addition, any deal must pass regulatory hurdles—including European regulators—and any deal reached after the principal parties come to terms could take up to 18 months to close.

In late February 2026, Paramount Skydance increased its offer to $111 billion in cash, or $31 per share, and stated that it would cover a $2.8 billion termination fee owed to Netflix should Warner Bros. Discovery break the deal and a $7 billion regulatory termination fee. The acquisition would be for the entirety of Warner Bros. Discovery, including its film and TV studios and linear cable networks.

On Feb. 26, Netflix declined to raise its offer to match Paramount’s revised bid. At press time, the deal was expected to be finalized following a Warner Bros. Discovery shareholder vote on March 20.

If approved, the $111 billion deal would unite two major Hollywood studios and one of the deepest content libraries in the industry.

“For all the regulatory noise, this deal ultimately comes back to the fundamentals of the entertainment business,” says Ed Barton, research director at Caretta Research. “Control of premium IP and global distribution maximizes engagement and builds scale that compounds.”

Paramount Skydance’s franchises (Star Trek, Mission: Impossible, Transformers, and SpongeBob SquarePants among them) combined with HBO’s premium positioning create a formidable global streaming proposition.

The resulting content juggernaut “would immediately become a more credible challenger to Netflix—not necessarily in raw scale on Day 1, but in depth and variety of monetizable franchises,” says Barton. “And while Netflix loses access to Warner Bros. IP in this scenario, it is far from vulnerable. It remains the most effective company in the market at monetizing IP at global scale.”

Three days after Warner formally signed an acquisition agreement, Paramount Skydance head David Ellison announced plans to merge the Paramount+ and HBO Max platforms, giving the combined platform 200+ million subscribers.

The combined Paramount Skydance-Warner Bros. Discovery entity will operate with a net debt of $79 billion. The deal is backed by $54 billion in debt commitments from Citigroup, Apollo, and Bank of America, according to Reuters.

Skydance Paramount

In August, more than a year after announcing its purchase of Paramount for $8 billion, Skydance Media closed the deal with CEO David Ellison promised to turn his new toy into a “tech-forward company that blends the creative heart of Hollywood with the innovative spirit of Silicon Valley.”

In November Paramount reported its first quarter since merging with Skydance. It made $6.7bn for Q3 which was flat year on year as its TV division continued to struggle. The company also posted a net loss of $257m based on merger-related expenses and restructuring costs.

The DTC side was rosier. Streaming revenue increased 17% to $2.17bn, with Paramount+ accounting for more than 80 percent of that growing its subs by 14% to over 79 million.

A unified technology stack is being introduced across Paramount+ and Pluto TV to enhance performance, improve user experience, and reduce costs. Paramount is also developing AI tools to power personalisation and recommendations. However, it will also raise Paramount+ prices in the US in the new year.

“Our direct-to-consumer business is our top priority,” David Ellison, Chairman and CEO of Paramount wrote to shareholders. “We expect it to be profitable in 2025 with growth in profitability in 2026.”

Strength in streaming

Strength in streaming continued to offset the structural weakness in traditional television in 2025 as studios shed their cable business and began to turn a profit from their DTC ventures.

This macro trend is reflected in the swelling values of the streaming video market. While estimates vary according to research analyst, the global market size is projected to grow from $250bn in 2025 to $1.6 trillion by 2035 or from $811bn in 2025 to $2.6 trillion by 2032. 

Overall, the U.S. remains the “largest and most influential” streaming video market globally, according to PwC’s 2025 Global E&M Outlook report. It generated $61.9bn in revenue in 2024 on track to reach  $112.7bn by 2029. The next largest market, per PwC, is China which is one fifth the size.

For comparison, the global broadcasting and cable TV market was estimated at $356bn in 2024 and is projected to reach $450bn by 2030, growing at a CAGR of 4% whereas the global creator economy market size is expected to grow at over 23% between  now and 2033 by which time it will have value of $1.3 trillion.

Streamers spent around $95bn on content in 2025, surpassing commercial broadcasters, according to Ampere Analysis with Netflix leading the pack. It spent around $18 billion on content in 2025 — and “We’re not anywhere near a ceiling”, according to Netflix CFO Spencer Neumann speaking as reported in Variety. He was speaking in March so if the deal for WBD proceeds expect figures going forward to dwarf that. Pre-sale, WBD was planning to spend in the order of $19.5bn on content including sports this year, according to MoffettNathanson reported in THR.

Per MoffettNathanson, Disney was tracking to outlay $23bn in 2025; Amazon $9.1bn on and pre-merger Paramount Global around $15.2bn.

Peacock

By end of the year Comcast’s board had approved the separation of the company’s cable television networks (including CNBC, MSNBC and E!) and complementary digital platforms from its remaining businesses in a process that began a year previously. Versant Media Group is the new independent, publicly traded company [VSNT] led by Mark Lazarus who will be living up to his name if he can turn around the fortunes of legacy media.

At the same time Versant acquired Free TV Networks, which provides both broadcast networks and FAST channels in the US. Comcast retains NBC, Bravo and Peacock which ended the year with around 41 million subscribers and had a $217m loss in the third quarter of 2025, following a $436m loss for the same quarter in 2024.

A new package of NBA games in addition to Sunday Night Football games produced by NBC Sports is expected to give the streamer a leap into the New Year.  Peacock revenue dropped slightly to $1.4bn Q3 compared with $1.5bn in same period 2024 when the Paris Olympics boosted results.

Commenting on Q3 results, Comcast’s then president Michael Cavanagh, now co-CEO, stressed the reliance that Peacock has on sports. “As audiences continue to shift from linear to streaming, the multiple benefits of sports becomes an even greater advantage,” he remarked. “Live sports continue to deliver strong viewership and ad performance across broadcast and streaming. Tunning linear and streaming as one integrated media business gives us real scale and flexibility. It allows us to align programming, marketing, promotion and monetization across NBC, Peacock and our studios… and well positioned to grow.”

Comcast bid for greater UK share

November saw Comcast move for the broadcasting wing of UK commercial broadcaster ITV. The business, which includes ITV’s terrestrial TV channels and streaming platform ITVX, is valued at U$2.1bn. Comcast, which already owns pay-TV broadcaster Sky, aims to create a UK-focused streaming giant with an advertising marketplace based on Comcast’s Universal Ads platform.

The move would face regulatory scrutiny because of the monopoly it would hold (70% of the domestic TV ads). However, Comcast also understands that the UK market which currently supports five main public service broadcasters is under increasing pressure to consolidate. If ITV were to be sold then pressure would grow on the BBC and Channel 4 to pool their resources including their streaming services iPlayer and All4 (though the major PSBs also combine to operate Connected TV app Freely).

Sir Peter Bazalgette, former chair of ITV and a shareholder, said, “There's going to be an inevitable consolidation of domestic broadcasters all across Europe. There are four or five domestic broadcasts across Europe who can't all have a long-term future against the streaming giants. There is going to be a consolidation, and ITV are going to lead it in the UK.”

Apple

In the year that Apple rebranded Apple TV+ to Apple TV the tech company continued its policy of curated rather than volume content. Since the company doesn’t release subscriber numbers, the best guesses are that by end of 2025, at least 45 million people are paying $12.99 to access shows like Slow Horses and F1: The Movie. It’s reckoned that Apple scaled back its annual budget for content from $5bn to $4.5bn but is still operating the service at a $1bn loss.

Amazon Prime Video

In June Amazon defaulted all subscribers to an advertising tier even for paid users, unless they opted to pay extra to avoid ads.

That default flip puts Amazon into a different category than other streamers—instead of discounting into an ad tier, Amazon is monetizing the entire base, noted Subscription Insider.

By end of the year, Prime Video had launched advertising in 16 countries including Australia, Brazil, India and Japan, and gathered 315 million monthly viewers, up from 200m when it introduced ads in April 2024. It does not break out ad revenue for Prime Video but in the third quarter, total ad revenue across all of Amazon was $17.7bn, up 24% YoY.

Calling the 315 million figure “a transformative milestone” Jeremy Helfand, VP of Prime Video Advertising, said, “We’re just beginning to unlock what’s possible when premium entertainment, engaged viewers, and innovative ad-tech converge with relevant and performant advertising at this unprecedented scale.”

"2026 could see Amazon Prime Video introduce a universal video search experience that spans platforms—including services outside the Amazon ecosystem,” predicts Mark Loughney, Senior Consultant, Hub. “By positioning itself as the easiest place to find anything to watch, Amazon stands to become a default viewing hub, with more consumers centralizing and managing their subscriptions through the Prime Video interface.”

Disney

In its Q3 earnings report, Disney CEO Bob Iger made a point of highlighting the success of its orientation to streaming: “Our DTC business was running a $4 billion operating loss just three years ago” and by Q4, September this had swung to a $352m profit and a 39% increase in DTC operating income.

There are now 131.6 million Disney+ subscribers, an increase of 3.8m compared to Q3, split roughly 50/50 between domestic and international. There are also around 64 million Hulu subscribers bringing the combined Disney+ and Hulu base to 195.7m.

Since June, when it closed a $9bn deal to buy Comcast’s 33% stake in Hulu, Disney wholly owns Hulu which it plans to fold into the Disney+ app. From Q1 2026, Disney will no longer report subscriber numbers for Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN+ because “the metric has become less meaningful” for evaluating the performance of its businesses, management said.

Full year revenues increased 3% to $94.4bn a performance that was considered flat by the markets and which was dragged down by its linear business, where domestic networks revenue and operating income dropped 16% and 21%, respectively. In 2026, Disney anticipates spending $24bn on content across entertainment and sports.