- Academy and YouTube sign Oscars deal
- The 101st Academy Awards will be broadcast on YouTube
- The event has been broadcast on ABC for almost 50 years
And the Oscar goes to… YouTube. Video streaming giant Google has just secured the 2029 Oscars ceremony and the red carpet events surrounding it. The show will leave Disney-owned ABC, its home since 1976.
It’s a big moment for streaming television and, perhaps, an unfortunate sign of the times for linear, aka. broadcast television. Streaming surpassed the combined audience of broadcast and cable again this year (the split is 44.1% for the pair and 44.8% for streaming), according to Nielsen.
Live events like the Oscars and sports have been one of the ways linear TV continues to win, but streamers like Netflix, Amazon, Apple and others have partnered with major sports leagues to bring live games to their platforms (Apple has MLB and MLS, Amazon Prime has some NFL games). However, award shows had stuck to broadcast and cable – until now. In recent years, Disney has also streamed the Oscars on Disney+ and Hulu.
According to a statement from the Academy, which hosts and manages the Academy Awards, YouTube will begin hosting the show in 2029 with the 101st Academy Awards and will continue to do so through 2033.
“We are thrilled to enter into a multi-faceted global partnership with YouTube to become the future home of the Academy Awards and our year-round Academy programming,” Academy CEO Bill Kramer and Academy President Lynette Howell Taylor said in the release.
Programming will include the annual nominee announcement, red carpet, Governors Ball and other behind-the-scenes content.
Perhaps most importantly for Oscar fans, the Oscar series will stream live and free on YouTube, as well as for YouTube TV subscribers.
By opening this envelope
After years of declining viewership, ABC and the Academy made some adjustments to the program in 2024, including increasing the show’s start time to an hour earlier, resulting in its largest audience since 2020.
19.5 million viewers, according to Nielsen, sounds like a lot, but YouTube has 2.7 billion monthly active users. In other words, the potential for reach could be much greater than the Oscars’ seemingly dwindling linear television opportunities. However, the move to YouTube will likely change viewing habits and cause some confusion among longtime Oscars fans who may not realize, for example, that they need a smart TV and run the YouTube app to view the 2029 event.
Naturally, this doesn’t matter much to, say, Generation Z, who rarely watch TV and are just as happy consuming shows on their smartphone or tablet.
As for what happens when the deal ends, Google and the Academy could reconcile, or Disney could come back with a more favorable streaming deal on Disney+. Likewise, Netflix, Amazon Prime Video or Apple TV could see an opening.
The fact is that all bets are off on the future of the iconic series, and linear television may never be the same again.
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