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NEW YORK — Football, wrestling and immersive experiences: This year, Netflix has expanded beyond its usual scripted and reality TV offerings.
Last quarter, the company reported a record high of 269.9 million subscribers, far outpacing streaming competitors like Disney+, Peacock, and Max (which is owned by Warner Bros. Discovery, CNN's parent company), fueled in part by the company's recent effort to push users who share passwords to create their own accounts.
However, the short-term subscriber jolt from the password-sharing crackdown could soon fade. The company recently disclosed that it would stop sharing its quarterly subscriber numbers beginning in 2025.
In the never-ending battle for eyeballs between traditional media companies and newer entrants like YouTube and TikTok, Netflix has, in the past two months, pushed further into the world of live sports programming and experiences.
And with Netflix's recent advance into advertising, the company is starting to look closer to the traditional media companies it seeks to disrupt, said Tim Nollen, a Netflix analyst at Macquarie.
"Whatever the old broadcasters were in their best of times, Netflix is becoming that in a new and probably longer-term, sustainable way," he said.
In May, Netflix disclosed that it has 40 million monthly active users on its new ad-supported subscription tier, a jump from 23 million in January.
Netflix reports second-quarter earnings on Thursday after the bell, likely further shedding light on its strategy.
The early stages of Netflix's evolution
Netflix made its biggest sports announcement yet in May. The company made a three-year deal to broadcast the NFL's Christmas Day games. The deal kicks off this year with Netflix globally airing two NFL games on the holiday. In 2025 and 2026, Netflix will stream at least one holiday game.
"Netflix is now in live sports," Nollen said. "This means Netflix might be the only place you will be able to watch those two Christmas Day games, which could obviously add more subscribers."
Airing football games has proven itself to be a winning strategy to juice subscriber numbers: In January, Peacock, NBCUniversal's streaming service, saw a jump of 2.8 million sign-ups in the three days leading up to its exclusive airing of an NFL playoff game.
The event was "the single biggest subscriber acquisition moment ever measured" by Peacock, according to the company.
Earlier this year, Netflix also announced another high-profile foray into sports programming: A 10-year deal to air "WWE Raw" live, valued at more than $5 billion.
But sports aren't the only way Netflix is trying to expand its footprint. Last month, the company said it plans to open two massive entertainment venues called Netflix Houses.
The "experiential" complexes, in former department store locations at Dallas Galleria and King of Prussia mall (near Philadelphia), will each span more than 100,000 square feet and include events, themed gift shops and restaurants. Both will open in 2025.
While these complexes don't quite reach the scale or footprint of Disney's or Universal's global theme parks, David Joyce, an analyst at Seaport, said the complexes are designed to drive brand loyalty.
"It should help retain those customers and keep them in the Netflix ecosystem and paying for their subscriptions for longer," he said.
