Fubo Lost 118,000 Customers in Q2 2023; Reports 1.17 Million Customers Heading Into Football Season
Fubo is looking to the start of the football season with great anticipation. The sports-forward live TV streaming service usually sees a bump as fall sports begin, which it needs if it wants to reverse its subscriber losses from its most recent quarter.
Fubo unveiled its second quarter 2023 earnings on Friday showing that the platform had lost 118,000 subscribers, to come in at 1.167 million customers, at the end of June; down from the 1.285 million users it reported having following the conclusion of the first quarter. Year-over-year, the figure represents an increase of 23% from Q2 of 2022, when Fubo had under 1 million users.
The company posted $304.6 million in revenue during the quarter, a 41% yoy improvement with the average revenue per user (ARPU) growing from $72.19 to $81.62 per month. The company is still operating at a loss, but net losses declined 43% over the second quarter of 2022, coming in at $54.2M. Fubo remains focused on becoming cash flow positive by the end of 2025.
One of Fubo’s biggest competitors in live TV streaming Hulu + Live TV dropped 100K subscribers in the first quarter of 2023 to bring it to around 4.5 million, but has not revealed its numbers for the second quarter of this year yet. Sling TV is expected to unveil its quarterly earnings report this week, but in Q1 it had over 2 million subscribers, despite a loss of more than 200,000.
The quarter started with a test from Fubo, who loves to experiment with ways to offer its customers more choices. This time, users of Fubo’s Pro plan were offered extra sports channels if they signed up for a plan that renews quarterly rather than monthly. Fubo also offered users a new “Instant Highlights” feature during the 2023 NBA playoffs, though there’s been no indication as to how well that experiment went for the company.
Fubo has teased more updates to its DVR offerings for customers as well, though these have not gone to the experimental stage thus far. Changes previewed include the ability to customize recordings to follow a team, or even a specific player, which would be incredibly handy for diehard sports fanatics.
The streamer is even partnering with a team owner to produce content. Wrexham A.F.C. co-owner Ryan Reynolds is partnering with Fubo for his Maximum Effort channel, which specializes in exclusive unscripted content. Maximum Effort is also available on free platforms like Sling Freestream and Amazon’s Freevee. The channel is even bringing back that beloved 1980s puppet ALF for a new series of exclusive adsthestreamable.com/news/ryan-reynolds-maximum-effort-channel-to-introduce-original-alf-ads-as-original-series-premieres.
Still, sports remains the focus for Fubo in terms of programming and features. The platform recently tested a splitscreen feature, combining several contests into preselected feeds. Fubo also helped Arizona Diamondbacks and San Diego Padres fans in their local markets start watching games after the teams' broadcast rights were given up by their previous owner Diamond Sports Group, which operates the Bally Sports family of regional sports networks.
Just this week, Fubo was named the official streaming partner of the WNBA’s Chicago Sky, gaining the ability to show Sky games on the Chicago-based Marquee Sports Network, which Fubo offers nation-wide. To celebrate the partnership, Fubo is offering new users a 14-day free trial for a limited time, double the length of its standard free trial!
Fubo
Fubo is a live TV streaming service with about 90 top channels that start at $79.99 per month. This plan includes local channels, 25 of the top 35 cable channels, and regional sports networks (RSNs). In total, you should expect to pay about $91.99 per month, after adding in their RSN Fee. Fubo was previously known as “fuboTV.”