Disney+ Will Unhinge Its Jaw And Swallow Hulu In 2026

It’s almost nan extremity of nan roadworthy for Hulu arsenic a standalone app. Now that it fully owns Hulu, Disney will wholly merge nan streaming work into Disney+. It will rotation retired a new, unified app adjacent year.

This doesn’t needfully mean that nan value of a Disney+ subscription is going to skyrocket successful 2026. A Disney spokesperson told Variety nan institution will still connection standalone plans for Disney+ and Hulu.

Disney CEO Bob Igor said connected an net telephone that having Disney+ and Hulu connected nan aforesaid tech level should thief nan institution trim costs and supply it pinch much ways to package advertisement sales. For users, Iger said nan unified app will connection an “improved user experience.” Iger and Disney CFO Hugh Johnston said merging nan services “will create an awesome package of entertainment, pairing nan highest-caliber brands and franchises, awesome wide entertainment, family programming, news and industry-leading unrecorded sports contented successful a azygous app." Disney+ is besides slated to get a much personalized homepage and different caller features successful nan coming months.

There will beryllium a notable alteration for Disney+ users extracurricular of nan US arsenic well. Disney will rebrand nan Star tile successful nan app to Hulu starting this fall.

Disney has been nudging its streaming services much intimately together for a while. Last year, it integrated Hulu contented into Disney+ successful nan hopes of getting much group to salary for a bundle that includes nan 2 services.

On apical of each that, Disney says it will soon (for nan astir part) stop disclosing subscriber numbers for Disney+, Hulu and ESPN+, pursuing nan likes of Netflix successful taking specified a step. Between them, Disney+ and Hulu had 183 cardinal subscribers astatine nan extremity of June, up 2.6 cardinal from nan extremity of March. Meanwhile, nan caller ESPN streaming work is group to debut connected August 21.