Tubi has officially launched in the U.K., marking the most significant overseas expansion for the free, ad-supported streaming service.
The Fox-owned AVOD platform is heading across the Atlantic with more than 20,000 movies and TV episodes on-demand, featuring content from the likes of Disney, Lionsgate, NBCUniversal and Sony Pictures, as well as its slate of Tubi Originals. “Outside of North America, this is a big one,” Tubi CEO Anjali Sud told Variety ahead of the launch. The expansion — which had been touted last year when it hired the U.
K.-based ex-Endeavor exec David Salmon as head of international — comes at a time of impressive audience figures, with Tubi now the fastest growing U.S.
streaming service. In May, it had its most-watched month ever according to Nielsen, up 46 percent on a year earlier with an average audience of 1 million viewers, edging out Disney+, comfortably beating Peacock, Max and Paramount+ and topping fellow free streamers the Roku Channel and Pluto TV. It now sits behind only YouTube’s viewers in the free ad-supporting streaming world.
According to Sud, the U.K. market — where public service broadcasters such as the BBC and ITV dominate the free streaming space — is one where certain audiences, particular younger and multicultural audiences, have been underserved by a traditional ecosystem looking to cater to as many people it can at once.
“Similar to the U.S., there’s been a natural need to revert to the median, to focus on mass.
