YouTube TV Loses Estimated 150,000 Subscribers in First Quarter; Has the Streamer Peaked?
YouTube TV revealed in February that it had reached over 8 million subscribers, but that number took a hit in the first part of the year.
The streaming business is a fickle game indeed. The good times rarely last forever, and the live TV streaming service YouTube TV found that out the hard way in the first quarter of 2024. YouTube TV had never suffered a subscriber loss in its seven-year history, but a new estimate from MoffettNathanson, as reported by Business Insider, shows that in the first three months of this year, the service shed 150,000 subscribers. Live TV streaming is always a bit cyclical because of football season, but is the first-time customer loss reason for YouTube TV executives to panic?
Key Details:
- The pay-TV industry as a whole took a big dip in Q1, losing 2.37 million customers.
- YouTube TV reported earlier this year that it had 8 million subscribers, more than all but three cable and satellite companies.
- The streamer will warrant close observation over the next year or two and concerns that it has peaked its subscriber count may be justified.
It wasn’t just YouTube TV that suffered subscriber defections in the first quarter. MoffettNathanson estimates that pay-TV distributors as a whole lost 2.37 million customers during the period. Extrapolated over the rest of 2024, that would mean cable, satellite, and live TV streaming providers will lose more than 10 million customers this year if those numbers continue unchanged. In 2023, cable and satellite companies lost almost 7 million subscribers, but nearly 2 million net additions from live TV streaming services (most from YouTube TV) helped to improve the numbers for pay TV overall.
The first quarter of any year is tough for live TV streaming services because many customers routinely sign up for a given service to watch college and pro football, then cancel their subscriptions once the seasons end. Sling TV lost 135,000 customers during the quarter, almost the same number as YouTube TV, despite having just 1.92 million customers overall, less than one-quarter of YouTube TV’s subscriber pool. YouTube TV broke with its usual policy of secrecy regarding its subscriber count in February to reveal that it had 8 million subscribers, more than any distributor apart from Comcast, Charter Communications, and DIRECTV. YouTube TV is especially susceptible to defections thanks to the end of football season because last year, it became the home of the NFL’s out-of-market game package NFL Sunday Ticket.
Could subscriber declines at YouTube TV mean that a long-term contract option is on the way for the service? A recent survey found that streaming customers would accept the return of this relic of cable’s heyday in exchange for meaningfully lower prices, and while YouTube TV isn’t likely to cut the cost of a subscription if it created long-term plans, it could find some on-demand streaming services like Hulu or Prime Video to partner with in a bundle that offers a big discount if people sign up for one or two-year contracts.
Has YouTube TV Plateaued?
It’s too early to say whether or not one quarter of subscriber losses means that YouTube TV has peaked. But it does seem like a big upset, especially considering that less than two months ago I was prognosticating that YouTube TV would become the biggest cable channel distributor in the United States in 2026.
That could still happen, but the fact that YouTube TV has never been affected by the end of football season to this degree before gives me pause. As mentioned, most live TV services, streaming or otherwise, see customers depart in the first quarter of a year, but that issue has never caused YouTube TV to lose subscribers before, at least not publicly. Economic pressures, lingering effects from the SAG-AFTRA and WGA strikes, and other factors could all factor into YouTube TV’s first-ever loss of viewers, but the simplest possible explanation is that YouTube TV has hit its customer ceiling, and may not grow materially larger than 8 million members in the coming years.
Measuring whether or not YouTube TV has peaked will be all the more difficult since Google keeps the streamer’s subscriber totals mostly private. But if it falls into the same pattern of other services that gain customers during the leadup to football season, then lose them once the season ends, it will show that YouTube TV is not the unstoppable juggernaut many assumed it to be when it announced it had grown to 8 million subscribers.
YouTube TV
YouTube TV is a live TV streaming service with more than 60 channels for $72.99/month. This plan includes local channels, 32 of the top 35 cable channels, and regional sports networks (RSNs) in select markets. The service includes an unlimited DVR.