Last week, Disney launched the new beta version of Hulu On Disney+ in the United States, which brought a vast selection of Hulu content into Disney+, drastically increasing the amount of general entertainment, with popular shows like “Criminal Minds”, “The Bear” and “Abbott Elementary”.

In March, Disney is set to launch Hulu on Disney+ fully, with more features, which is expected to result in a massive bump in engagement for Disney+ users and reduce the churn of subscribers.

Internationally, general entertainment content from Disney’s studios, like ABC, FX and 20th Century Studios, has been available on Disney+ for almost two years and has been a huge success, which is one reason why Disney is making the change to bring Disney+ and Hulu closer together, likely to merge Hulu fully into Disney+ eventually.

According to some new data from Ampere Analysis, offering a combined Disney+ and Hulu platform will leapfrog above Netflix’s popularity and volume in the US.

Looking at the last quarter, one-third of the top one hundred shows can be found on Hulu and Disney+, 17 on Hulu and 16 on Disney+, with Netflix sitting at 29 while Max had 18 and Amazon had 11. They based this data on many key metrics such as interest, web traffic and box office income.

The combined Disney+ Hulu app will leapfrog Netflix in both popularity and volume in the U.S., according to a report from Ampere Analysis.  And the combined platform will also mean Disney+ and Hulu together, have more titles available than Netflix, though still behind Amazon. However, it’s sometimes difficult to compare the size of streaming libraries since both Hulu and Amazon offer add-ons like Starz and Max, which may inflate those numbers.

The addition of Hulu’s content into Disney+, with shows like “Only Murders In The Building”, and “American Horror Story” will bring much more variety to the platform, which has been heavily dominated by tentpole franchises like Star Wars and Marvel, along with children’s and family content.

In the US, Hulu currently has more subscribers than Disney+, but most of those subscribers have access to Disney+ through the Disney Streaming Bundle. And with the Hulu on Disney+ beta underway, it’ll be interesting to see how viewing habits change as more people start watching Hulu content within Disney+, strengthing the value of the bundle.

According to Ampere analyst Joshua Rustage.

“With a combined app offering Disney+ and Hulu due to launch in the U.S. in early 2024, its compelling new streaming content offer will surely shake up the status quo.

The combined Disney+ and Hulu catalogue will provide one of the most well-rounded and popular offerings in a single platform, upping the content stakes at a time when many are pulling back on content investment. Rivals will have to ensure their offerings remain competitive as the battle for viewing time intensifies, especially as the need to pull in advertising dollars is now also central to the streaming mix.”

Disney is still stating that it wants to continue to offer Hulu and Disney+ as separate services. With the streaming bundle with Disney+, Hulu and ESPN+ offering incredible value and lower churn rates, we will likely see more blending of the lines of where Hulu ends and Disney+ begins, especially once the full service begins in March.

Over the last year, there has been much criticism of how much content is being released on Disney+, as the number of originals has been reduced, less library content has been added, and many underperforming titles have been removed.   With a push into making Disney+ more profitable, offering Hulu on Disney+ in one place, drastically increases the perceived amount of content released each week on Disney+, showing that Disney has the volume to keep up with Netflix’s output, but because it has been spread over different streaming platforms and linear channels, it wasn’t benefiting from offering them all in one place.

While we still have to see how Hulu on Disney+ will change over the next year or so, it will considerably impact the streaming industry.

Will you be using Disney+ more now Hulu content is available within it?  Let us know on social media!

Roger Palmer

Roger has been a Disney fan since he was a kid and this interest has grown over the years. He has visited Disney Parks around the globe and has a vast collection of Disney movies and collectibles. He is the owner of What's On Disney Plus & DisKingdom. Email: Roger@WhatsOnDisneyPlus.com Twitter: Twitter.com/RogPalmerUK Facebook: Facebook.com/rogpalmeruk

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