How movies and shows end up on your streaming services: studio rights explained
- Movies and shows are licensed rather than sold directly
- Pay TV and video-on-demand are typically licensed before streaming
- Rights are increasingly licensed to multiple platforms
If, like me, you love nothing more than watching a great new movie on a great home theater kit, you’ve probably been asked this question more than once about an exciting new release: When is it coming to one of the top streaming services – and which streamer is it coming to? ? And the answer is: it’s complicated.
In a simpler world, every movie would come to every streaming service. But of course we live in a much messier world, which is why we write separate guides to the best films to come. NetflixUnpleasant Disney PlusUnpleasant MaxUnpleasant Prime VideoUnpleasant Paramount Plus and to Apple TV Plus.
So how do certain movies end up on certain streamers, and who decides who gets what and when? Let’s find out.
How movies don’t sell
It is important to clarify what it means when we talk about films being released. Films are not sold directly; in most cases, the companies that paid for it own it, and they would like to keep it that way. What studios and their distributors do is sell licenses to show, sell, or stream films in a certain way, in a certain place, and for a certain period of time.
If your local multiplex shows Wicked, it didn’t buy the movie; the theater chain has purchased a license to show the film in certain areas for a few weeks or months. Likewise, when Prime Video, Max or Paramount Plus offers a movie as part of your membership, the streamer has purchased a license that gives them the right to stream it – again in certain territories for a certain period of time.
Film licenses are not only licensed to different companies in different parts of the world, but also sold at different stages. A studio film is usually first shown in theaters, made available digitally as pay-per-view or buy-to-own and then made available via streaming.
It’s a little different with TV shows, because of course there is no cinema release. But unless a show is created internally by a streamer, it is licensed in much the same way as movies.
Windows on the world
The film industry uses the term ‘release windows’ to describe the different phases of a film release campaign. So you have the theatrical release window, the pay-per-view window, the first streaming release window and so on.
The first release window is the original theatrical release. That used to take a very long time, usually three to six months or more, and then COVID came along. With theaters closed, studios have vastly reduced or completely abandoned the theatrical release window, turning instead to pay-per-view and streaming deals. And while COVID closures are thankfully a thing of the past, the much shorter theatrical windows remain.
Theatrical licenses are traditionally exclusive: you usually cannot rent or buy a film anywhere while it is still showing in the cinema. But the time between a movie hitting theaters and it being available to rent, buy or stream is much shorter than it used to be.
Everything speeds up
According to Indiewirethe average theatrical run for all major studio films in 2023 was just 37 days. There were outliers such as Oppenheimerwhich appeared alone in the theater for 122 days. But that one was really unusual. The same studios Super Mario Bros Movie was more typical (and profitable), ending its theatrical run after 41 days.
Indiewire’s analysis shows that Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour film ran for 60 days, while Disney films averaged 62 days, A24 films 48 days, Paramount 42 days and Sony 35 days. The shortest theater window? Five nights at Freddy’swhich didn’t have one: it was available on Peacock from day one.
FNAF was the third-biggest horror movie opening in film history, but its release is unlikely to be widely copied. The consensus is that simultaneous releases are more likely to cannibalize box office sales — especially in genres like horror, which teens love to watch together in theaters — and miss out on the word-of-mouth that can turn modest successes into big ones.
When the run is done
Once the theatrical run is over, it’s time for the release window that’s important for streamers. That’s called the Pay One Window, and it’s when movies are moved from the theater to the home.
During the Pay One Window, the rights to show a film are sold to two different markets: the PVOD/TVOD market (paid/transactional video on demand, also called pay-to-rent and buy-to-own) and the SVOD market. which is short for streaming video on demand.
SVOD means streamers like Max, Prime, Netflix and Hulu; TVOD means rentals and purchases on Apple TV (but not Apple TV+), Google Play, the Microsoft Store, Amazon (but not Included with Prime) and other digital storefronts.
It’s always clearest when we use a real example, so let’s take it Barbie. Barbies The theatrical run began in July 2023 and remained exclusive to theaters until September 2023, when it became available via TVOD platforms as a pay-to-rent and pay-to-buy digital release. It then became available for Max subscribers to stream in December 2023.
When the Pay One window ends, it’s time to sell more licenses. This next release period is known as the Pay Two window and is when older films are licensed, often to different streaming services than during the Pay One period. For example, Sony has a Pay One deal with Netflix, but a Pay Two deal with all Disney platforms.
Of the two windows, the Pay One window is the more desirable: pent-up demand for big-name movies drives sales of new streaming subscriptions in a way that older movies don’t. But Pay Two Window licenses tend to be cheaper, meaning they allow streamers to expand their catalogs relatively cheaply.
Relationship status: It’s complicated
Traditionally, Pay One Window deals were valid and exclusive for a maximum of 18 months. So if a movie went to Peacock, it wouldn’t also go to Amazon Prime for at least a year and a while. But modern film markets are much messier, and all that Variety According to reports, most studios are now licensing multiple streamers, either simultaneously or somewhat staggered.
As if that wasn’t complicated enough, some movie studios also own streamers and some streamers make movies. Apple TV+ and Netflix, for example, make movies that debut in theaters first, but are made with streaming in mind; Disney, the company, owns Disney the studio and Disney Plus the streamer, so Disney movies move to Disney Plus after their theatrical run ends. But Disney also owns 20th Century Fox and Searchlight, and those films don’t just end up on Disney+ or Hulu, which are owned by Disney; they are usually licensed to HBO and Max as well.
Here’s how Variety describes it. “Netflix gets major studio awards from Sony Pictures and additional prestige films from Sony Pictures Classics, while Prime Video offers a rotating selection of Universal and Paramount titles, in addition to Amazon’s MGM films after they finish on MGM+. Disney’s streamers also ultimately get Sony titles , and Hulu is also where arthouse distributor Neon’s films are streamed after their theatrical screenings.”
Like we said, it’s complicated – and it’s only going to get more complicated.