Summary
First things first, let’s make a couple of important points clear: if you are going to evaluate streaming services based just on the number of customers they have, you are not really engaging in a fair contest. Certain locations may not provide all of the services that are offered. Also, the number of members does not truly answer the question of whether or not a streaming service is “worth” Or if it is simple to use, or whether the applications are of any quality. To put it another way, if a certain streaming service offers the content that you are interested in watching, which is the one and only criteria that is required.
top 10 streaming services popular
It is nevertheless intriguing to keep up with how things are performing from a global viewpoint, particularly when you consider that relatively new upstarts such as Apple TV+ are garnering so many plaudits in an industry that is dominated by Netflix.
In light of this, and keeping in mind that the majority of the information presented here comes from streaming services (or the organizations that own them), here is a list of the top 10 streaming services in terms of the total number of members.
1. Netflix: 269.6 million
Among all streaming services, Netflix is the most popular and widely used. By the 31st of March in 2024, the firm had recorded a total of 269.6 million paying memberships around the globe. It was an increase of 3.6% from the previous quarter, and it was an increase of 16% from the previous year.
Can you tell me the key to Netflix’s success? One should reach out. Compared to the other services on our list, it has been accessible all over the world for a longer period of time. (It should be noted that not all of the services detailed on this list are accessible on a worldwide scale.) On their own, the United States of America and Canada account for 82.66 million members. 91.73 million people are accounted for by Europe, the Middle East, and Africa. The Asia-Pacific area has a population of 47.5 million people, whereas Latin America and Mexico have a combined population of 47.72 million. There’s a lot of the world out there.
The second reason, however, is that Netflix offers such a vast selection of material that it is impossible to obtain elsewhere. Movies. Shows. Not native. In the home. In point of fact, Netflix has seized on this situation by blurring the barriers between nations via the use of aggressive marketing, language dubbing, and subtitles. For example, the craze known as “Squid Game” propelled a series that was originally produced in Korean to the attention of international audiences.
Additionally, since Netflix is consistently adding new material, there is always something fresh to watch if you subscribe to the service.
There is, however, a significant shift that will take place in the future: Netflix has declared that it will no longer provide quarterly paid membership figures, as well as average income per membership statistics. This is due to the fact that one subscription is not the same as the next in terms of revenue. To clarify, the amount of money that Netflix makes from a user who subscribes to the most affordable plan with advertising is not the same as the amount that a user who subscribes to the top tier brings in. At the beginning of the first quarter of 2025, this modification will take effect.
2. Amazon Prime Video: 200 million+
When compared to the other streaming services available in this region, Amazon Prime Video stands out. Both it is and it is not the case. The fact that you may subscribe to it and see a wide variety of content makes it, in a way, identical to all the others. It is, however, a component of the huge ecosystem that is Amazon Prime. As part of the membership cost that you pay for Amazon Prime, you not only get access to nearly an infinite number of movies and programs, but you also pay a monthly or yearly charge for the service.
However, Amazon Prime Video is also the place where you can rent or purchase movies and television series. Consequently, it is definitely feasible to make use of Amazon Prime Video without possessing an Amazon Prime subscription. Additionally, Amazon Prime Video serves as a gateway to a variety of other streaming services with its extensive collection of channels. As a result, you are able to subscribe to Amazon Prime Video’s Paramount+ or Max services, for example. In addition, Prime Video is the only place in the United States where you can watch certain sports that are not available anywhere else, such as Thursday Night Football for National Football League games.
There is a great deal going on in this room.
In spite of this, Amazon Prime Video is a massive deal. In addition to being accessible in over 200 countries, it is worldwide. Andy Jassey, the CEO of Amazon, stated during the company’s earnings call for the third quarter of 2023 that “Prime Video continues to be an integral part of the prime value proposition, where it’s often one of the top two drivers of customers signing up for Prime.” Although Amazon does not publicly release actual numbers for either Amazon Prime or Prime Video, Jassey stated in his letter to shareholders in 2021 that Amazon had “over 200 million Prime customers.” Jassey’s letter was his first as CEO after succeeding Jeff Bezos, the founder of the company.
There are several private estimates that increase from there. On the other hand, 200 million is a reasonable estimated estimate for the low end. Moreover, in the year 2024, Amazon is planning to further monetize Amazon Prime Video by including advertisements, or it will charge consumers an additional $3 to remove advertisements.
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3. Disney+: 150.2 million
During the introduction of Disney+ in November 2019, the company was not bashful about its plans to expand internationally. There is no doubt that it did not begin with a modest beginning, since it achieved more than ten million members on its very first day of operation.
Take a moment to process the number in your mind.
Additionally, Disney+ has been quite active in combining itself with other streaming services owned by Disney, such as Hulu and ESPN+, and pricing the package in such a way that you are urged to purchase all three of these services together. Consequently, there will be some overlap between the two.
Naturally, Disney+ is the place to go in the United States for all things related to the letter D, in addition to Marvel, Star Wars, Pixar, and National Geographic. In addition, if you are a subscriber to Hulu, you may now access the material that is available on Hulu inside the Disney+ app.
Additionally, depending on the nation in which you are located, Disney+ has a variety of distinct tastes. This is where another service in India known as Hotstar comes into play. Hotstar incorporates live sports in addition to more than 100,000 hours of television series and movies that are available in nine different languages. We call it Disney+ Hotstar, and while it is distinct from the rest of the world, it is still a component of the overall image.
The following is a breakdown of it: As of the 30th of September in the year 2023, there were 46.5 million members to Disney+ in the United States and Canada. There were also an additional 66.1 million users in other countries, bringing the total number of customers around the globe to 112.6 million. The total number of members for Disney+ Hotstar has increased to little over 150 million, with an additional 37.6 million joining the service.
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4. Max: 97.7 million (sort of)
Max is the only service that has ever undergone a more significant makeover. Prior to its transformation into HBO Max, it was known as HBO Go and HBO Now. The present parent business, Warner Bros. Discovery, was formed as a result of the merger of the owner, Warner Bros., and the discovery firm. From this point on, the streaming service is known as Max.
The 97.7 million figure that Warner Bros. Discovery provided in its financial report for the fourth quarter of 2023 is the one that we take into consideration here. On the other hand, it is a complicated statistic that includes all of WBD’s direct-to-consumer customers individually. That covers the classic HBO and HBO Max services, as well as the Max service that is now available. Discovery+ is still operational.
When everything is said and done, Max will continue to change as it develops. additional recent additions include the addition of additional news material via CNN Max and the Bleacher Report sports add-on, which features more than 300 live events yearly. These events include the National Hockey League, the National Basketball Association, and the United States Soccer Association.
In addition, Max is continuing to grow. In the first quarter of 2024, it will expand into Latin America, and in the spring of the same year, it will expand into Europe. Additionally, you will have the opportunity to bundle the forthcoming mega sports streaming initiative, which will contain live sports broadcasts from Disney (think ESPN and other similar networks) and Fox, in addition to events that Max has the rights to broadcast.
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5. Paramount+: 71.2 million
When we talk about streaming services that are supported by whole studios, we should mention that Paramount+ is a worldwide service that is still very much a thing. (Despite the fact that several experts say that it will eventually be necessary to consume it, most likely by the next item on our list.)
under addition to being a part of the Paramount+ package, a number of well-known businesses are also included under the Paramount umbrella. Think about material from CBS. As well as the premium Showtime network, which is no longer a separate service but has instead been fully integrated with Paramount+. Additionally, there is BET, Comedy Central, and Nickelodeon in addition to MTV. Paramount+ has also been a streaming home for the National Women’s Soccer League (NWSL) and the Champions League soccer. It is also the place to go if you are a fan of the Star Trek franchise.
In addition, Paramount disclosed in its financial report for the first quarter of 2024 that the number of subscribers to Paramount+ had reached 71.2 million, representing an increase of around 18% compared to the previous year.
Paramount may find itself in the middle of a merger or purchase, according to rumors that have been circulating. On the other hand, there are no takers as of yet.
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6. Hulu: 48.5 million
Over the years, Hulu has gone through a lot of changes, both in terms of the content that is available on the site and in terms of the ownership of the company. Late in the year 2023, Disney, which had previously held a significant portion of the company as a result of its acquisition of 21st Century Fox, bought out Comcast’s 33 percent of the company’s shares and now controls the whole company.
Hulu is well-known for its on-demand boutique programming, which includes shows like as The Handmaid’s Tale and Only Murders in the Building. However, the streaming service also offers a massive amount of other on-demand entertainment, particularly from the Fox side of the equation. The on-demand service offered by Hulu enjoys the support of 43.9 million paying members. One thing that makes things a bit more complicated is the fact that if you are enrolled to both Disney+ and Hulu, you may now watch Hulu from inside Disney+. On the other hand, Disney+ does not have access to all of Hulu’s content.
According to Disney’s financial report for the third quarter of 2023, Hulu is also home to the second-largest live TV streaming service in the United States, with 4.6 million customers. Additionally, those customers are instantly enrolled in the Disney package, and they are also listed as members of both Disney+ and ESPN+.
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7. Peacock: 34 million
The streaming service from NBC is called Peacock. In addition, despite the fact that it has undoubtedly encountered a number of challenges, including the cancellation of a significant portion of its first slate of exclusives due to poor viewing, its corporate masters have persevered. Peacock has a healthy 34 million paying customers as of the first quarter of 2024, according to the company’s current statistics. That is an increase from the 31 million members it had at the end of 2023, and it is more than three times as many as the 9 million subscribers it had at the end of 2021, according to the results report of the parent business, Comast.
What a terrible streaming service that nobody wanted, isn’t it? It is possible that the popularity is attributable, in no little part, to the fact that it is the streaming home of the English Premier League in the United States, in addition to the fact that its pricing is inexpensive. In addition, there is still a great deal of other content that can be seen on Peacock.
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8. ESPN+: 26 million
ESPN+ is a fascinating streaming service that requires a membership metric. The service is owned by Disney and offers a variety of live sports, including both professional and college competitions, as well as original content that can be accessed on demand. Additionally, it provides a streaming alternative for those who have conventional access to ESPN+ via a linear subscription. (Think about services such as cable, satellite, or YouTube TV, among others.)
ESPN+ is home to a vast array of live sports, despite the fact that it does not currently provide standalone access to ESPN and does not, for the most part, make accessible the live sports that are broadcast on ESPN itself. If there is a sport and you are able to conceive of it, there is a fairly high probability that you will be able to watch it on ESPN+. This includes all collegiate sports, live broadcasts of mixed martial arts and the Ultimate Fighting Championship, the German Bundesliga, the Association of Pickelball Players, and the Belgian Championship League. This is just a superficial examination of the situation.
ESPN+ was released in the spring of 2018, and it took around five months for the service to reach its first million members. The number of paying members has been continuously increasing since then, and it now stands at 26 million, according to the most recent financial report that Disney released for the fourth quarter of the fiscal year 2023. As you will see in the next paragraphs, a significant portion of this is accomplished via standalone subscriptions; however, ESPN+ also reaps the advantages of the Disney Bundle, which, as its name suggests, brings together Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN+ for a single price that is almost too reasonable to pass up.
Disney did not provide any updated stats for ESPN+ for the fourth quarter of 2023. Nevertheless, it did make the announcement that a separate ESPN service will be made accessible at some point during the autumn years of 2025.
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9. Apple TV+: 25 million (estimated)
We do not have a precise count of the number of subscribers that Apple TV+ has. As is the case with almost every other device that falls under the Apple banner, the corporation does not provide any numerical information, either in its financial reports or via anecdotal evidence. Take everything with a grain of salt, at least.
According to estimates, there are somewhere in the neighborhood of 25 million paying users to Apple TV+, which is accessible on all contemporary streaming platforms and is not limited to Apple technology. (More are not included in the trial period that is associated with the purchase of Apple hardware.) However, to restate once again, Apple does not provide official figures. Therefore, we just do not know.
In any case, it would not come as a surprise to us if that number increased even more as a result of the fact that MLS Season Pass is only available on Apple TV+, and Lionel Messi is only available to Inter Miami. Just for the last several months of the 2023 season, that was all that was done.
Taking into consideration the fact that Apple TV+ offers unique movies in addition to a number of high-quality television series, such as Ted Lasso, The Morning Show, Lessons in Chemistry, For All Mankind, and Monarch: Legacy of Monsters, it is clear that the service is not going away any time soon.
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10. Starz: 15.88 million
Starz is one of those streaming services that focuses on movies and gives the impression that it has always been present, even if you have not actually utilized it outside of a trial circumstance. However, it is fairly large, although it may not come as much of a surprise once you understand that it is effectively the official streaming service of the Lionsgate company.
Starz is a worldwide service that has accumulated 15.88 million members as of the 31st of December, 2023, according to the financial report that Lionsgate released for the latest quarter. (This adds an additional 8.85 million linear customers, which includes users of cable and satellite television, among other services.)
