Report: With 40% of Best Picture Nominees Not on Streaming Services, Those that Are Struggle to Find Audiences

In recent years, any time a movie is released in theaters, one of the first questions on people’s minds is “When will it be released streaming?” However, the problem comes when some of the most acclaimed films of the year eventually drop on streaming services, they can often struggle to find a foothold, showing that glowing reviews and prestigious accolades don’t always translate into viewership.

Many of the most well-respected movies of 2022 — including some of this year’s top Oscar contenders — have had difficulty gaining a sizable following on streaming platforms, according to PlumResearch data provided to Variety Intelligence Platform through its Showlabs platform. And despite Oscar-nominated films being more accessible than ever – six of the 10 Best Picture nominees are on major streaming video-on-demand (SVOD) platforms, three are available on premium video-on-demand (PVOD), and “Avatar: The Way of Water” is still in theaters – their cultural cachet appears to be eroding quickly.

In their first 28 days of streaming, three of the five best picture nominees tracked by Showlabs reached more than 5 million hours viewed. However, two of those three were the blockbuster films “Elvis” and “Top Gun: Maverick,” and most notably, the third was “All Quiet on the Western Front” on Netflix, which was extensively promoted on the streamer’s homepage.

This corresponds to data released by other analytic providers. Since “Elvis” debuted on HBO Max on Aug. 8, 2022, fans in the United States have streamed it for a total of about 2.7 billion minutes, according to new data from Nielsen. Additionally, “Top Gun: Maverick,” upon its release on Paramount+ in late December, became the platform’s most-streamed movie premiere to date, and “All Quiet on the Western Front” has 1.6 billion minutes streamed since its release on Netflix on Oct. 22.

Related: How to Stream All 2023 Oscar-Nominated Movies

However, the two other five best picture nominees tracked by Showlabs failed to find traction on streaming platforms despite having won and been nominated for various awards. “The Banshees of Inisherin” won four of its 10 nominations at the BAFTAs, but the film only attracted 3% of HBO Max users in its first four weeks of streaming. Similarly, “Tár” attracted less than 2% of active users and fewer than 500,000 unique watchers in its first week of streaming, arriving on Peacock only three days after receiving Oscar nominations in several major categories.

These figures especially pale in comparison to other incredibly popular films released on streaming around the same times last year, none of which were nominated for Best Picture. Netflix’s “Glass Onion: A Knives Out Mystery” become one of the streamer’s most popular films, garnered a 17% watching share and 2.9 billion viewing minutes in just its first week on the platform after a limited theatrical release, according to Nielsen. Meanwhile “Hocus Pocus 2” and “Black Panther: Wakanda Forever,” both released on Disney+, pulled 2.7 billion minutes and 2.3 billion minutes, respectively, during their first weeks on the streamer.

But all of this should be taken with a grain of salt. This year, films, in general, had longer theatrical runs, given the diminished concerns about COVID-19 and the change in distribution strategies, such as the end of Warner Bros.’s experiment to simultaneously release films in theaters and on streaming. For example, unlike to 2021’s “Don’t Look Up” — which had a 14-day exclusive theatrical window before arriving on Netflix — 2022’s “Triangle of Sadness” is still inaccessible to streaming audiences nearly six months after making its theatrical debut, despite being nominated for three Oscars.

While comparing the 2023 Oscars to any during the height of the COVID pandemic is tricky, looking back to last year shows that this year’s slate is being handled substantively differently with four of the 10 nominated films still not available.

Obviously not every Oscar nominee is going to have success on streaming, and naturally, the ones with the greatest commercial appeal are more likely to find an audience than the artsier ones. But as the industry continues to try to rebound after the devastating effects of the pandemic, having 40% of the theoretical best movies of the year unavailable for streaming audiences feels like a missed opportunity, even if they wouldn’t automatically become breakout hits.

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