Hulu Reaches 45.3 Million Subscribers in Q1 2022, Including 4.3 Million with Hulu + Live TV
As part of their Q1 2022 Earning Release, Hulu added 1.5 million subscribers for a total of 45.3 million as of the end of 2021. That includes 4.3 million Hulu + Live TV subscribers, which was up for 4 Million from last quarter.
In 2021, Hulu added 5.9 million subscribers, including 300,000 of those with Hulu + Live TV.
In October, Hulu raised the prices of their SVOD service by $1 to $6.99 a month (with ads) and $12.99 a month (without). During the quarter though, they ran their annual Black Friday promotion that dropped the price to $0.99 for 12 months.
While the impact has yet to be seen, in December, Hulu Live TV raised its prices by $5, but began including The Disney Bundle with the subscription.
Most recently, Fox and Hulu set a streaming output deal, which gave the streaming service access to numerous Fox series such as The Masked Singer,” “LEGO Masters,” “I Can See Your Voice,” Fox’s animated comedy “HouseBroken,” and other unscripted titles like “The Masked Dancer,” “Name That Tune,” “Gordon Ramsay’s 24 Hours to Hell and Back,” “MasterChef,” and “MasterChef Junior.” The deal was one of the first notable moves by Joe Earley since he became president of Hulu.
In early January, OWN: The Oprah Winfrey Network was added to Hulu Live TV. This came just in time for the January 7 release of “Ladies Who List: Atlanta” and “The Kings of Napa” which debuted on January 11.
The addition of fan-favorite shows may have come at a necessary time being that Hulu experienced its slowest growth quarter in two years, only adding just 1 million customers in Disney fiscal Q4. Another period of slow growth was from fiscal Q3-Q4 in 2019, which was the first full two-quarter period following Disney’s closure of its Fox acquisition and its takeover of Hulu. Overall, customer growth seems to be decelerating. Hulu added a total of 7.2 million customers in fiscal 2021, whereas in fiscal 2020 it was 8.1 million.
Disney-owned Hulu has been lacking on the content front, especially with its originals. In typical Hulu fashion, there were a couple of sci-fi and thriller series as well as docu-series like “The Curse of Von Dutch: A Brand to Die For,” “Pharma Bro,” “Mother/Android,” “Godfather of Harlem,” “Ailey,” “Pam & Tommy,” “Sex Appeal,” and “Women of the Movement.” Also, a lot of hit series made a comeback with new seasons such as “The Great,” “Pen15,” and the fifth season of “Rick and Morty” recently popped up on the platform. The “How I Met Your Mother” reboot, cleverly called “How I Met Your Father,” was a highly-anticipated title yet still didn’t have as much of a wow factor compared to the Disney+ series “The Book of Boba Fett.”
A title that appeared on the platform most recently was Guillermo del Toro’s “Nightmare Alley” which debuted just two months after opening in theaters. However, it also dropped on HBO Max at the same time, giving viewers the choice to flock to one or the other.
The streaming service will get the upcoming Hulu Original “No Exit” which premieres on February 25th. The thriller (another one, how shocking) has a solid premise about a blizzard, a remote rest stop with a handful of stranded travelers, and a kidnapped child hidden in a car outside.
And if that isn’t enough to drive subscriber growth, “The Dropout” most likely will. Set to debut two months after Holmes was convicted of defrauding investors, the series will star Amanda Seyfriend as Elizabeth Holmes, the former CEO of failed blood-testing startup Theranos. With Holmes’ trial fresh in everyone’s minds, viewers may be curious to learn more about the story. “The Dropout” will premiere on March 3.