Forecast: W. Europe to hit 191m SVoD subs by 2025
September 21, 2020
Western Europe will have 191 million SVoD subscriptions by 2025; more than double from 90 million at end-2019, according to Digital TV Research. About 35 million subscribers will be added in 2020 alone, with the pandemic lockdowns having a major effect.
Netflix will remain the largest platform, with 68.49 million paying subscribers expected by 2025. Despite adding 25 million subs between 2019 and 2025, Netflix will lose market share.
Disney+ has made a strong and immediate impact, given its brand recognition, low price and content line-up. The service launched in the remainder of Western European countries this month.
Simon Murray, Principal Analyst at Digital TV Research, said: “Disney+ will have a huge impact. However, we have downgraded Disney+ since our last forecasts in April. After strong early take-up and based on its June results, subscriber growth will decelerate rapidly. We have increased our forecasts for the ‘other’ category due to the wave of launches due from the likes of Hulu, Paramount+ and Peacock.”