Less than two decades after Netflix first introduced its streaming service in 2007, the video streaming industry has grown to a valuation of over $811 billion in 2025, and is projected to reach a whopping $2.66 trillion by 2032. Streaming services have taken over as one of the leading forms of digital entertainment, significantly disrupting cable and broadcast television, and completely transforming consumer behavior and expectations.
In the United States, streaming media accounts for roughly 54% of American adults’ weekly video viewing, with the average American spending roughly 23 hours a week on streaming services. U.S. consumers on average are subscribed to 3.92 video streaming services.
Today, the digital media space is dominated by household name giants Netflix, Amazon Prime Video, Disney Plus, Max, and Apple TV+, among several others. Each streaming platform offers its own library of movies and TV shows and has a differentiated approach to attracting subscribers.
As the streaming industry has matured, the balance between profitability, competitiveness, and customer retention has become increasingly difficult to strike. As a result, many platforms are shifting their strategy from subscriber acquisition to profitability — through ad revenue, bundling, sports rights, and adding value to retain existing customers.
Below, we use the AlphaSense platform to:
- Identify the top players in the streaming landscape today
- Uncover key trends shaping the streaming landscape, including the growing competition between streaming services and the shift to profitability
- Explore the major challenges streaming providers are facing to attract and retain customers, as well as differentiate from competitors
- Discuss the future outlook for the streaming industry
Top Players in Streaming Services
Netflix
In addition to being the first mover in the streaming space, Netflix remains the most subscribed to video streaming platform, with over 312 million subscribers worldwide, as of June 2025. Its projected revenue for FY25 is a whopping $45B. While Netflix began as an aggregator of movies and TV shows, it’s since become a well-respected producer of original content, which helps it attract new customers.
Netflix differs from its competitors in several key ways. First, it’s a tech company, which means it’s more adaptable to new technologies and also has the resources to continually improve its tech based on subscribers’ preferences. For instance, Netflix is known for its highly accurate algorithm that provides customized recommendations for viewers based on their interests and preferences. Second, unlike for the majority of its competitors, streaming accounts for 100% of Netflix’s total revenue.
In 2023, Netflix made the controversial decision to crack down on password sharing when it recognized it was losing out on both subscribers and revenue by allowing multiple people to use a single account. While the decision initially led to a stock dip, as well as an outcry from consumers, it ultimately resulted in a surge of subscribers and a revenue jump. What’s more, it’s prompted many competitors to take similar measures, leading to a shift in the streaming landscape and subverting users’ expectations.
As it is considered to be the “default streamer”, Netflix has flexibility to raise prices above competitors’ levels. Netflix’s membership cost is $17.99 per month, with a lower-priced ad tier at $7.99 a month and a higher-priced premium tier at $24.99 a month. Users can also add a limited number of members to their account for $6.99 each.
For more on Netflix — including company documents, news, broker research, and expert transcripts — check out the NFLX page in AlphaSense.
Amazon Prime Video
Introduced in 2011 by e-commerce giant Amazon, this streaming service has about 350M subscribers as of 2025. However, it’s important to note that this service is built into Amazon Prime subscribers’ packages, so the aforementioned figure includes subscribers who do not utilize the Video offering at all.
Like Netflix, Amazon both aggregates existing content and produces award-winning original content for its platform. Additionally, for movies and shows not available in Amazon’s free on-demand library, the option to rent or buy for an added fee and watch immediately is available.
In 2024, Amazon introduced ads to the default Prime Video offering, with the option to pay an extra fee for no ads. This decision aligns with the overall industry trend of relying on ad-tier monetization. In the past couple years, Amazon has also prioritized live sports as a key growth driver for Prime Video, investing significantly more dollars than its competitors into high-profile deals with the likes of NFL, NBA, WNBA, and NASCAR, among others. Analyst research on the AlphaSense platform suggests that sports content is critical for Prime member acquisition and retention and will continue to be a key growth lever for Prime Video,
As Amazon Prime Video is part of the Amazon Prime membership charge, the cost per month is $14.99, with some discounts for students and select groups.
For more on Amazon — including company documents, news, broker research, and expert transcripts — check out the Amazon page in AlphaSense.
Disney Plus
One of the newer streaming platforms, Disney Plus was established in 2019 and has already amassed over 126 million subscribers, as of mid-2025. The main reason for its success is the immense popularity and demand of its content universe. Upon establishing the platform, Disney pulled all of its licensed content from other streaming platforms and turned Disney Plus into an immense repository of Disney-owned content. This also includes all Marvel, Pixar, National Geographic, and Star Wars content.
In the last few years, Disney Plus subscriber numbers declined and are now growing very slowly. Disney has recently been pivoting its strategy from subscriber acquisition to improving profitability per user. To that end, Disney has cracked down on subscription sharing, bundled Hulu and ESPN into its subscriptions, and also removed certain titles to cut costs. Disney is also focusing on rebranding its streaming service to be less associated with content for children and more of an all-inclusive adult streaming service, so as to better compete with Netflix.
Disney Plus is priced at $9.99 for the ad-tier version and $13.99 per month for no ads.
For more on Disney — including company documents, news, broker research, and expert transcripts — check out the Disney page in AlphaSense.
HBO Max
Established in 2011 and originally called HBO Go, this was previously a service for HBO channel subscribers to stream HBO programming online. In 2015, HBO launched an on-demand streaming platform called HBO Now, available even to those without a subscription to the HBO television channel.
Then in 2020, HBO Max replaced both HBO Go and HBO Now and began expanding globally and introducing new, mostly original content. Finally, in 2022, WarnerMedia merged with Discovery, Inc. (becoming WBD) and rebranded HBO Max to simply Max, adding content from Discovery, as well as additional Warner Brothers features.
In July 2025, WBD decided to change the streaming platform’s name back to HBO Max in order to lean into the established brand prestige of HBO and to decrease user confusion. HBO Max has been highly successful, mostly due to its high-quality, award-winning, and often viral original content. Notably, HBO Max has only become profitable for Warner Bros. Discovery in 2024, largely due to global expansion and strong content strategy.
As of early 2025, HBO Max has just over 120 million subscribers and three pricing tiers: premium ad-free for $20.99, standard ad-free for $16.99, and an ad tier for $9.99.
For more on Warner Bros. Discovery, Inc. — including company documents, news, broker research, and expert transcripts — check out the Warner Bros. Discovery page in AlphaSense.
Apple TV+
Another relatively recent entrant, Apple TV+ was established in 2019 and is owned and operated by Apple Inc. Compared to its competitors, Apple TV+ has a much smaller content library and is also priced more affordably at $9.99 per month.
As of July 2025, Apple TV+ has around 45 million subscribers, a number that has grown significantly in recent years due to high-quality, award-winning, exclusive content on the platform and the fact that users get three free months of Apple TV+ with purchase of an Apple device.
Apple is currently investing heavily to build prestige content and sports offerings (with an exclusive 10-year deal to stream Major League Soccer, which started in 2023). Apple is quite unique from its other competitors, as it’s subsidized by a vast hardware/services ecosystem. Though this streaming platform does not pose a major threat in market share, it occupies a strong niche and will likely continue to be a formidable player in the space, in no small part due to Apple’s financial prowess.
For more on Apple — including company documents, news, broker research, and expert transcripts — check out the AAPL page in AlphaSense.
Short Form Video
While short-form video competition is not a subscription video on demand (SVOD) player, it does represent a new medium that is more attractive to younger viewers and is steadily gaining market share in the streaming space. Google’s YouTube and TikTok represent a unique threat to the streaming business. YouTube’s ad-supported model, which allows for revenue sharing among content creators, is a key differentiator which may impact the traditional subscription model in time.
Key Trends in Streaming
Streaming Bundles
Streaming service bundles are becoming more common and will likely keep growing in popularity. Why? Firstly, they provide more flexibility and variety to the consumer while also being much more cost-effective. Secondly, bundling is effective at reducing churn, as it minimizes the common practice of canceling a subscription for a service upon finishing a particular show. Finally, bundling helps streaming services offset the rising cost of content, as they can effectively offer more content to subscribers without needing to purchase it themselves.
Disney has offered a Disney Plus, Hulu, ESPN bundle for years — which has helped them retain customers by increasing the perceived value of Disney Plus for users. In recent years, major players like Netflix, HBO Max, and Disney have launched cross-company bundles (Disney/Hulu/Max bundle and Verizon’s Netflix/Disney bundle). This strategic move helps companies expand their reach without taking on as much customer acquisition cost. This also helps address customers’ increasing subscription fatigue since they can avoid paying for and toggling between multiple separate platforms.
The drawback to this approach, of course, is it hearkens back to the days of cable TV, where consumers were limited by the channels available on cable TV. The more consolidated streaming platforms become, the less ownership and choice consumers have over what they can watch.
“We've already talked about this quite a bit when it comes to the bundling and the continued migration to more of a cable-type model. That's, I think, going to be one of the biggest changes over the next few years, is that purchasing the streaming subscriptions a la carte is going to change…
I think we're going to start seeing more channels on the streaming services, and that the bundling across companies is going to be one of the main changes we see.”
– Former Director of Product Management at Walt Disney Company | Expert Call
Profitability Over Subscribers
Throughout the history of streaming services, subscriber count was seen as the ultimate indicator of success or failure.
“…The subscriber numbers were the way that you were proving to either your financial backers or to Wall Street that you were growing, and so it was a little bit of a growth-at-all-cost mentality. Something like Netflix was spending billions of dollars and gaining millions of subscribers, and so they set the template, and then when you would launch your product, your goal was to show how many millions of subscribers you had and how you could grow that. That has since changed.”
– Former VP, Warner Bros. Discovery Inc. | Expert Call
In early 2022, Netflix announced that it had lost subscribers for the first time in a decade. This was a turning point for the industry. Streaming companies had been operating under the assumption that they only needed to focus on attracting new subscribers, and eventually, they could raise prices to counteract any losses. And yet, Netflix’s announcement showed there was a clear ceiling to what consumers were willing to pay for streaming before they canceled their subscriptions. Consequently, streaming services had to look to alternative methods of boosting profitability.
Since 2022, virtually all the major streaming platforms enacted measures to improve their bottom line — price hikes, cost-cutting by removing content, and cracking down on password sharing.
Platforms are also focusing more on retention than acquisition, finding ways to add value to their content offerings to reduce churn and increase brand loyalty. This looks like investing in higher-quality content production, integrating live and sports content, and bundling with other platforms.
Ad Tiers
History seems to be repeating itself, as more and more streaming services are moving toward elements of cable and broadcast television to maintain profitability. At this point, nearly every top streaming service has introduced a lower-priced ad tier in its subscription options, allowing it to earn more money from ads and capture more price-sensitive customers.
The new motion is paying off — Netflix is set to generate roughly $2 billion in ad revenue by 2026, according to broker research, and Disney consistently pulls in over $3 billion in ad revenue each year since 2021. Amazon Prime made the decision to default all users to ads in 2024 — a stark change for a company that was operating ad-free for over 15 years.
In a surprising twist, streaming platforms are finding that in order to stay afloat in the industry, they need to emulate the very industry they disrupted in the first place. Ad-supported tiers are significantly more lucrative, as they allow the streaming service to make money off new subscribers, as well as ad revenue. At the same time, some experts have voiced concerns about the long-term viability of ad tiers, since they are often associated with more churn. While platforms can technically grow ad revenue by increasing ad load, not every platform can do that without losing customers — though Netflix has established itself as essential enough where they have more room to raise prices.
AI, Customization, and Personalization
Artificial intelligence has disrupted every industry over the past decade, and streaming is no exception. Highly successful streaming companies know that in order to retain subscribers for the long haul, they must do more than simply deliver content — they must create an experience that feels unique and personalized to each consumer. This means investing in AI algorithms that collect data about each viewer’s behaviors and then provide customized recommendations that match the user’s preferences.
Streaming platforms that create original content have also been using AI and data analytics to assess what is most popular with their user base so that they can incorporate those preferences into their future productions. Similarly, by analyzing viewer data and trends, streaming services can better predict what external content will perform best with viewers, which then informs the content they choose to invest in.
Just as consumers are seeking out more personalization and customization in their retail shopping, dining, and consumer goods preferences, so too are they looking for that in their entertainment. Netflix has a leg up in this domain, as it has always been a tech company first and a content company second. Therefore, it has the advantage of years of investment in data and AI, enabling it to deliver better, more tailored experiences to customers.
Most streaming platforms (Netflix, Amazon, Disney, and others) are now using AI-powered recommendation engines that factor in viewing history, time of day, and contextual metadata — helping them reduce churn and improve the user experience. Additionally, AI is being used to power more precise, relevant advertising on ad-supported tiers, improving monetization without degrading the viewer experience. At the same time, legacy media companies like Paramount are learning that even having top-tier content is insufficient without strong AI curation algorithms to surface it to the right viewers at the right time.
Looking ahead, the next frontier of AI in streaming is content creation. Netflix has already spearheaded this movement with their AI-generated VFX, and Amazon and Warner Bros. Discovery are testing similar capabilities. Though it’s still early days, this new evolution could drive a larger gap between tech-forward platforms and their more AI-resistant peers.
With the fast pace of technological innovation in the streaming space, incorporating AI into core business strategy is quickly becoming table stakes. Legacy media companies — such as Disney, WBD, and Paramount — will need to accelerate their digital transformation efforts to remain competitive with their more tech-driven peers like Netflix and Amazon.
Sports Appeal
Another major trend driving the streaming industry is sports programming. Streaming platforms have recognized that a substantial pool of subscribers is interested in streaming live sporting events. Adding sports streaming helps platforms reduce churn — rather than constantly needing to add high-quality content to keep subscribers, streaming providers can simply allow sporting events to do the heavy lifting. Live sports are also highly attractive to advertisers, further boosting ad revenue and monetization opportunities.
Amazon offers sports streaming of NFL, NHL, and WNBA in the US, as well as Champions League games in Europe. Apple TV+ features Major League Baseball and Major League Soccer. Disney Plus leverages its partnership with ESPN to deliver a growing slate of live spots and is expected to launch a standalone ESPN streaming service in late 2025. Even Netflix — long resistant to live sport — joined the fray by broadcasting two live NFL games on Christmas Day in 2024. Even smaller platforms Peacock and Paramount+ have added live sports, simulcast from NBC and CBS.
The introduction of sports into the streaming equation has ushered in a sports rights arms race among the top players, with platforms competing for exclusive access to leagues and events worldwide. However, platforms must take care to not just focus on getting the exclusive rights, but also prioritize technological excellence and interactive features that enhance the viewing experience. Low-latency streaming, alternate broadcasts, real-time stats, and interactive overlays can go a long way in attracting and retaining sports fans.
Much like the return to ad-supported models and premium bundles, the pivot toward sports streaming evokes the legacy of cable and broadcast television. Yet it’s now become critical for streaming platforms to integrate live sports into their acquisition and retention strategies. The key difference is that with today’s technology and evolved consumer expectations, there are more opportunities for streaming platforms to differentiate themselves by bringing something new and better to the sports viewing experience.,
“The live sports component really plays in well to attract advertisers and also anchor users into a platform. There's no one more dedicated to a piece of content than sports fans are. It's definitely becoming an anchor for a lot of different platforms because users are going to want to stay subscribed and engaged and they will watch when the programming does come on. That focus isn't necessarily depressing the viability or the licensing opportunities for scripted or non-sports content. It's definitely made it seem maybe less valuable to the different platforms.”
– Former Director, Paramount Global | Expert Transcript
Future Outlook on Streaming Platforms
The streaming landscape is undoubtedly changing. Sub-scale platforms are likely to consider M&A as larger players expand content and technology and retain pricing power. Artificial intelligence and digital transformation are pushing the bounds of what was previously possible and irreversibly shifting consumer expectations. At the same time, the proliferation of ads, live entertainment, and bundling on streaming platforms hearkens back to the heyday of cable television.
What does the future of streaming platforms look like? Most industry experts believe it looks smaller. The current market is far too saturated, and consumers are reaching a breaking point with how many platforms they are willing to subscribe to. According to a 2025 Deloitte survey, 47% of consumers say they pay too much for the streaming platforms they use, and 41% say the content available on the streaming platforms is not worth the price.
At the same time, the cost of producing and acquiring content is getting increasingly higher, and not all platforms are able to invest in AI or live entertainment at the level they will need to in order to compete with the industry giants. Eventually, platforms will need to find ways to mitigate and share that cost.
“For the case of Warner, they can't sustain by themselves the costs of production and media rights and whatnot. That's why, I think, the future for them, Paramount or Warner, is to partner with either a tech company or another studio to be able to reduce the risk, to expand their reach, and to have also more content ultimately to offer to their subscribers.”
– Former VP, Warner Bros. Discovery Inc. | Expert Transcript
There is also still tremendous room for improvement in the streaming industry. For example, as one expert suggests, integrating social media and user-generated content into streaming platforms remains an area of opportunity that no one is taking advantage of. Adding even more personalized features and creating more differentiation between unique customers’ viewing experiences is something social media platforms have mastered, but streaming platforms could stand to improve on.
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