Roku Reports 71.6 Million Active Users in First Quarter; Grows to 25.1 Billion Streaming Hours
Things are pretty good at Roku these days, according to the company’s most recent earnings report. Roku released its data from the first quarter of 2023 on Wednesday, April 26, and the report showed that its ad-supported video-on-demand (AVOD) and free ad-supported TV (FAST) platform grew to 71.6 million active users during the first three months of the year.
That’s an increase of 1.6M customers over the 70 million that Roku had when it last reported its numbers in February. Roku saw 25.1 billion hours streamed, an increase of 1.2B over the 23.9 billion reported last quarter, and a 20% increase year-over-year.
Those numbers put platform ahead of Tubi, the free streaming platform operated by FOX. Tubi most recently reported having 64 million active users. Roku’s free streaming service still lags behind Pluto TV, however; Pluto last reported having 79 million monthly active users. Amazon’s free streamer Freevee does not publicly report subscriber numbers or earnings.
There has been no slowdown in the addition of new channel offerings to The Roku Channel this quarter. The service has added dozens of new free streaming channels, with selections ranging from horror movies and cartoons to trail running and everything in between. The Roku Channel now stands at over 450 FAST channels and is adding more seemingly every week.
The company has been doing everything it can to fulfill its CEO’s promise that it would use original contentto keep users engaged. Kevin Hart’s “Die Hart 2: Die Harter” recently became The Roku Channel’s top original TV series premiere of all time, and there’s much more to come from the service. New Spanish-language originals, a “Great British Baking Show” spinoff, and a docuseries about a group of recruits trying to become the next great WWE superstar are all headed to The Roku Channel in the coming months.
This is the first quarter in which Roku’s in-house manufactured line of TVs became available to consumers. Roku picked tech retail giant Best Buy to be its exclusive partner for selling its smart TVs, which are available in 11 models ranging from 24” to 75”. Roku TVs come in two distinct product lines: the high-definition Select series, and the Ultra-High-Definition 4K-enabled Select series, and can be purchased at Best Buy now.
Roku Channel
The Roku Channel is a free live TV streaming service that provides 350+ live linear streaming channels and more than 80,000 free movies and TV shows. The library contains entertainment from several different decades, including some major hits.