Monthly churn rates for Disney+ and Hulu doubled in September as consumers threatened to boycott streaming services following the temporary suspension of “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” because of comments the late night host made about Charlie Kirk’s alleged killer.
According to new data from Antenna, Disney+ saw about 2.18 million signups during the month, while Hulu saw just over 2.1 million signups. But the monthly churn rate of the former increased from 4% in August to 8% in September, while that of the latter increased from 5% in August to 10% in September.
An Antenna spokesperson told TheWrap that estimated cancellation volumes for Disney+ and Hulu were 3 million and 4.1 million, respectively, compared to averages of 1.2 million and 1.9 million, respectively, over the past three months.
When asked what caused the spike, the company declined to attribute the cancellations directly to Kimmel’s suspension. In addition to the Kimmel saga, Disney revealed last month that it would raise prices on several of its streaming packages starting Tuesday.
A Disney insider told TheWrap that the percentages Antenna reports do not incorporate its wholesale operations are higher than what the company sees internally, but declined to elaborate.
The person noted that there was an increase in pending cancellations in September, some of which were expected due to notifications of pre-planned price hikes, but that this quickly subsided. They also said they’ve already seen people reinstate their subscriptions since Kimmel’s situation was resolved.
A company spokesperson declined to comment.
When looking at streaming cancellations across services for the month, the weighted average churn rate was 7%. Apple TV+ climbed 6% to 7%, HBO Max climbed 7% to 9%, and Discovery and Netflix each remained steady at 6% and 2%, respectively.
Apple TV+ had a total of approximately 1.98 million registrations, Discovery+ had 265,543 registrations, HBO Max had approximately 1.86 million registrations, Netflix had 1.6 million registrations, Paramount+ had 2.98 million registrations, and Peacock had 2.72 million registrations.
Separately, Antenna estimates that Disney’s new ESPN streamer saw 2.1 million signups between its Aug. 21 launch and Sept. 30, while Fox One saw 1.1 million signups. These figures do not include existing Disney subscribers who left other plans, nor people who activated the service through their pay TV provider.
Antenna calculates churn based on cancellations in a given month divided by subscribers at the end of the previous month. Monthly churn rate includes unintentional churns, such as credit card declines.
The company’s data, which covers the United States only, is based on digital purchase and cancellation receipts, consumer subscription signals, credit, debit and banking data. It includes signups directly through the Services, as well as Amazon Channels Amazon Fire TV, Disney Bundle, Google Play, Hulu, iTunes, Paramount Bundle, Roku Apps, The Roku Channel, YouTube TV, and YouTube Primetime Channels.
Antenna’s data comes as Disney has not publicly revealed how many streaming subscribers may have canceled due to Kimmel’s suspension. It is expected to release its latest quarterly subscriber figures for Disney+ and Hulu on November 13.
Disney will no longer release subscribers and average revenue per user for ESPN+ starting this quarter, while Disney+ and Hulu will no longer release the metrics starting in the company’s first quarter of 2026.
Disney shares are up 15% over the past year and 32% over the past six months, but are down 1.16% in the past month.
