This article wasn’t the one I had planned to write. Initially, I simply wanted to measure the impact (or lack of impact) of how quickly theatrically released films arrive on streaming on their performance in the United States, drawing on Nielsen data that I’ve been collecting for more than five years. I also intended to add a variable I had so far left aside: the delay between a film’s theatrical release and its availability on streaming.

Then a “small” event came along and turned everything upside down: the official announcement of Netflix’s acquisition of Warner Bros. Discovery. A deal that is still far from finalized (Paramount is back in the race, and a long regulatory journey awaits everyone), but one that has already had an immediate effect on the global entertainment industry. Ted Sarandos, one of Netflix’s two CEOs, took the opportunity to question the exclusive theatrical window for future Warner Bros. films under the Netflix banner, calling the current U.S. window “anti-consumer.” The message is clear: Netflix wants to shorten it.

However, the debate around this exclusive window is often confused. PVOD (Premium VOD, available as early as 17 days after theatrical release for some films at fairly high rental prices, around $20) is frequently lumped together with SVOD (availability at no extra cost within a paid streaming subscription), even though these are two distinct windows that currently follow one another at the major studios. In the future vision for Warner outlined by Sarandos, Netflix would undoubtedly like to be able to offer Warner films on SVOD under a window that we can imagine being shorter, without really knowing what that would mean in concrete terms. Personally, I imagine something between 21 and 45 days after theatrical release, and that’s what I’ve highlighted in the charts in this article. Such a window is bound to provoke the expected reactions from theater owners and moviegoers, who see it as a direct threat to the economics of movie theaters.

But it’s worth remembering that in the United States, the time between theatrical release and availability on SVOD has never been a fixed barrier, unlike in France, where it is set by the Chronologie des Médias, an industry-wide agreement. Over the past four years, it has fluctuated constantly across the Atlantic, in line with the studios’ shifting strategies.

For this analysis, I therefore reviewed more than 200 U.S. studio films that had wide releases in theaters between 2022 and 2025, as well as their subsequent availability on the major streaming services. The goal: to observe the delay between theatrical release and streaming debut in order to see what strategy each studio is adopting, and whether this window has evolved between 2022 and 2025. I deliberately set aside 2021, because decisions made at the time were shaped by movie theater closures linked to COVID, which was truly an exceptional situation. Let’s dive in!

Let’s start with Amazon MGM, a studio that has already announced it will be stepping on the gas when it comes to theatrical releases as early as 2026, with no fewer than 12 to 15 films planned for U.S. theaters, according to the company. We don’t yet know how many of these will be wide releases versus limited releases, but such statements make it clear that Amazon MGM is seeking to buy itself a bit of goodwill from U.S. theater owners.

And they’re going to need that goodwill, because among all the American studios analyzed in this study, Amazon MGM may well be the one that trims the theatrical window the most. After a period in which its major films would first land on MGM+ before moving to Prime Video as a second window, its most recent high-profile titles have instead arrived on Prime Video in the United States between 29 and 41 days after their theatrical release. The most emblematic example is Red One, which opened shortly before Thanksgiving last year and was then fast-tracked onto Prime Video in mid-December to capitalize on the holiday season.

At the time, some U.S. theater chains clearly did not appreciate such a close streaming release following the theatrical one, but they were neither consulted nor even informed in advance. It’s actually quite amusing to reread the articles from that period, as they largely focus on how Amazon managed to turn Red One into a huge streaming success despite its near-simultaneous theatrical release. To which I feel like replying: “Well, that seems pretty logical!”, though I’m not sure U.S. theaters were exactly thrilled about that success.

Since then, Prime has done it again with The Accountant 2 (slightly lengthening the window, from 29 to 41 days, and with far more modest streaming results, even if still solid), and had already tested the waters with AIR in 2023. Amazon is very clearly trying to play both sides: publicly positioning itself as a friend of movie theaters by announcing 10–15 theatrical releases per year, while at the same time shortening the exclusive theatrical window as much as possible. And if I put myself in Netflix’s shoes regarding Warner films, I can’t help but look at this and think, “Why not us, if they’ve managed to get this past the major U.S. multiplex chains?”

Admittedly, these films have not been major box office hits (none has crossed the $100 million mark), but Amazon is the only studio in this analysis to have put its biggest theatrical success in the shortest exclusive window. So, it will be extremely interesting to see how quickly Amazon MGM’s 2026 lineup, both its hits and its flops, ends up on Prime Video.

So far, Apple TV has been relatively cautious and has not attempted an Amazon Prime Video–style maneuver for its few theatrical films, with windows between theatrical release and streaming availability on Apple TV ranging from 70 days for the flop Argylle to 168 days for the hit F1: The Movie, which just arrived on the service. It’s also worth noting that Apple has not handled the theatrical release of all its films itself, having struck distribution deals with other companies, and that, for now, no Apple films are scheduled for theatrical release in 2026.

The strategy being applied here seems to be the following: the bigger a film’s theatrical success, the more its release on Apple TV is delayed, in order to give the PVOD window more time to generate revenue. I’m genuinely very curious to see how F1 performs on the service, to find out whether this extended window has created anticipation (or, on the contrary, subscriber disinterest) and whether Apple will decide to repeat the experiment in 2026.

Disney+ is a particularly interesting case, because it’s a service that has clearly been feeling its way on this issue. The theatrical films with the shortest exclusive windows (Strange World, Lightyear, and Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness) were all released during the Chapek era, when driving engagement on Disney+ was a top priority. That’s how Encanto ended up on Disney+ just 30 days after its theatrical release in 2021 (not covered in the infographic), as did Strange World. Both were disappointments at the box office, but on Disney+, Encanto in particular, they became massive hits.

Then Chapek was ousted and replaced by Iger, who decided to restore some discipline to window lengths. From an average of 50 days under Chapek, we’ve now moved to an average of 102 days under Iger. What the infographic suggests is that at Disney today, the bigger a film’s success in U.S. theaters, the longer the window tends to be, albeit with a few exceptions. I can’t really explain the unusually long window for the latest Indiana Jones film or for Wish, but there is no doubt an explanation.

This lengthening of the theatrical window has gone hand in hand with a relatively modest decline in streaming performance (15 million CVEs on average over the first 15 days for films released under the Iger era, compared with 17.5 million for films released under the Chapek era), largely thanks to the strong performance of animated films. When it comes to other titles (live-action films or MCU entries) the drop-off is far more dramatic.

If you want to learn more about the contraction of Disney+, that’s the subject of another deep dive published a few weeks ago, which I encourage you to read here:

Let’s stay with Disney and look at the two studios that feed Hulu, 20th Century Studios and Searchlight Pictures (with Neon also seemingly having a first paid-window deal). At first glance, there doesn’t appear to be a clear strategy here, with films whose exclusive window lengths seem largely disconnected from their theatrical success.

Other factors are undoubtedly at play here, and I also note that the 2025 lineup for both studios is much more heavily weighted toward year-end releases (Avatar: Fire & Ash, Predator: Badlands, Is This Thing On?, Deliver Me from Nowhere), for which we don’t yet have official streaming release dates. These titles could therefore give this infographic a very different look in a few months’ time.

Up until the end of 2022, HBO Max was the service where 20th Century Studios films premiered first, which is why you’ll see titles like Avatar: The Way of Water and Barbarian in the infographic. Since then, those films have moved back to Hulu, and HBO Max now receives Warner Bros. films and A24 titles in the first window. I’ve focused on Warner Bros. releases, as I assume these are the films over which the studio has direct control when it comes to streaming release dates.

The first thing that stands out is the almost metronomic regularity of the windows for films released in 2025, regardless of whether they were theatrical hits or not. All of them had a 77-day exclusive window, except Superman, which had a 70-day window (apparently to align with the launch of Peacemaker season 2).

Before 2025, Warner Bros. was far more pragmatic, sometimes waiting more than 140 days, as in the case of Barbie, or only 45–46 days for films like Don’t Worry Darling, Fantastic Beasts: The Secrets of Dumbledore, or Barbarian. A shortened window like that could well align with what Netflix may be looking to do in the future.

I also can’t avoid mentioning Jason Kilar’s infamous “Popcorn Project”: the decision to release the entire 2021 theatrical slate simultaneously on HBO Max and in movie theaters. I haven’t included it in this analysis because it truly belonged to a different era. But there’s no doubt that this is precisely the kind of experiment that could also appeal to Netflix if it were to get its hands on Warner Bros.

Regularity is also the name of the game at Paramount Pictures, whose films premiere on Paramount+. In 2025, the studio has methodically stuck to a 60-day window in almost every case, with one fairly emblematic exception: Tom Cruise films. These titles receive special treatment at Paramount, with ultra-long exclusive windows ranging from 190 to 210 days.

It’s hard not to see the influence of the actor here, who seems to have a deep dislike of streaming, or alternatively a desire on Paramount’s part not to upset their golden goose, even if the most recent Mission: Impossible films have not matched the success of Top Gun: Maverick.

In the past, Paramount flirted with the once-taboo 45-day mark after theatrical release, particularly for films released in 2022 through mid-2023. It has since moved away from that approach in favor of a 60-day window, and the new management doesn’t appear to have shifted on this issue yet, although only one film has actually been released under their supervision so far, The Naked Gun.

As the battle for Warner Bros. appears to pit Netflix against Paramount, the latter has stated that a combined Paramount/Warner Bros. studio would release 30 films per year in theaters. The open question is whether the exclusive window ultimately chosen for all of those films would be Warner Bros.’ 77 days or Paramount’s 60 days.

Two studios supply Peacock with theatrical films (Universal and Focus Features) and I chose to focus solely on Universal titles, which already makes for a substantial body of films to analyze. Among all the studios covered in this analysis, Universal may well be the one that has taken the most pragmatic approach in the past: it has sometimes released films simultaneously in theaters and on Peacock, as with Five Nights at Freddy’s, Halloween Ends, and Marry Me, while also experimenting with relatively short 45–50 day windows, the more traditional 90-day window, and even much longer ones, up to 210 days in the case of Oppenheimer.

As the infographic shows, much like Disney, Universal appears to lengthen the window for films that enjoy major theatrical success, likely in order to fully monetize the PVOD and physical windows before making the film available on Peacock.

The overall trend, however, is clearly toward a longer exclusive window, which has increased from an average of 52 days for films released theatrically in 2022 to 96 days for those released in 2025.

Since 2022, Sony films (as well as Sony Classics titles, which I won’t cover here) have premiered in their first window on Netflix under an agreement that appears to be extremely strict, with a median window of 120 days, the longest of any studio. Unlike the other cases, Netflix and Sony are entirely separate entities, and they therefore adhere closely to the contract they signed, which seems to favor two specific windows: 90 and 120 days.

There have been a few outliers here and there (58 days for Devotion or 150 days for Father Stu and Morbius) but that’s about it. Nonetheless, it’s worth noting that since 2022, the window has been significantly shortened, dropping from an average of 128 days to 92 days in 2025.

Back in 2019, when Netflix was preparing to release The Irishman, months of negotiations took place between the streamer and U.S. multiplex chains to reach an agreement that would allow a wide theatrical release for Martin Scorsese’s film. Netflix wanted a maximum 45-day exclusive theatrical window before making it available on the service, while the multiplexes were willing to go down to 60 days, twelve days shorter than what had been commonly accepted. Netflix refused to budge, the theaters refused as well, and this stalemate essentially continues today, at least for Netflix.

Other studios, however, have clearly shifted their approach: windows now extend up to 99 days for Disney, 96 days for Universal, and 92 days for Sony (all three slightly down from 2024). Warner Bros. now sits at 76 days and seems determined to stick to it, as does Paramount with its 60-day window for all films not starring Tom Cruise.

If Netflix were to acquire Warner Bros., it could try to reduce the window to around 60 days, as Paramount does, but it could also follow Amazon’s example (a fellow tech company) and push it down to roughly 45 days, which Amazon does fairly regularly without pushback from theater owners, a window which Netflix had sought for The Irishman and it could potentially get now.

For its most prestigious original films, Netflix doesn’t hesitate to do limited releases in a handful of theaters, runs for which Netflix does not provide any box office figures. The longest of this type of release was 35 days for Noah Baumbach’s White Noise.

Is this the upper limit that Netflix is currently willing to accept? Only time will tell (or maybe not, given how long the road ahead is and how steep the climb!).

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