• by Karlene Lukovitz  @KLmarketdaily, September 30, 2021

Disney+ will surpass Netflix in global subscriptions in 2025, forecasts the latest subscription-video-on-demand (SVOD) update from Digital TV Research.

The report projects that Disney+ will add 140 million subscription subscribers between 2021 and 2026, to bring its total to 284 million.

About 121 million, or 43%, of Disney+ subscribers in 2026 will be in the 13 Asian countries under the Hotstar brand.

Netflix is forecast to add 53 million subscribers, to reach 271 million by 2026.

Together with Amazon Prime Video, projected to reach 243 million, the three services will account for nearly half of the world's SVOD subscriptions within five years. 

Total global SVOD subscriptions are forecast to increase by 491 million, to reach 1.64 billion by 2026.

China and the U.S. will have a combined share of 49% of the total — down from 56% this year.

Services from China will be subscribed to by over 350 million users. Of those, Tencent will be the largest with 98.7 million, followed by iQiyi (76.8 million) and Youku (48.1 million).

China and the U.S. had a similar number of subscriptions at the end of 2020, but China’s growth is slowing due to government pressures, while the U.S. will continue to grow — reaching 450 million subscriptions by 2026, explains Simon Murray, principal analyst at the research firm.