Disney+ and ITVX have forged a “first-of-its-kind” agreement to share content from each other’s service on their respective UK platforms.
Starting July 16, a curated, and regularly refreshed selection of series and films from ITVX will be available on Disney+ and vice versa, under the respective banners Taste of ITVX and Taste of Disney+.
Disney+ viewers will be able to stream ITV scripted and unscripted content including true-life drama Mr Bates vs The Post Office, espionage thriller Spy Among Friends, and historic library titles such as Endeavour, Vera, and series one of Karen Pirie, coinciding with the second series premiere in ITVX.
Concurrently, ITVX audiences will have access to a rotating rail of Disney+ shows and films, updated regularly from the US giant’s library. Titles will range from the first series of FX’s The Bear, Star Wars original Andor and Hulu comedy drama Only Murders In The Building.
Disney could not yet confirm which film titles would be included in the partnership.
There is a longstanding licensing partnership between Disney and ITV, which brought Disney+ UK and Star originals to ITV viewers. In 2023, Broadcast revealed that comedy Extraordinary and FX/Star crime drama Under The Banner Of Heaven would be heading to ITVX. This deal was swiftly followed by Welcome To Chippendales, Culprits and other UK originals Renegade Nell, Shardlake and the forthcoming Under The Bridge.
Taste of Disney+ and Taste of ITVX are available to each platform’s user at no extra cost and Disney and ITV will sell advertising against the respective pillars – ITVX is an ad-supported BVoD and Disney+ will sell advertising on the Disney+ standard with ads plan.
Disney+ EMEA’s general manager Karl Holmes would not go into financial details of the arrangement, but told Broadcast that the new content swap deal is “mutually beneficial and mutually supportive”.
Disney will define success from the pact as: “does this enable Disney+ to grow”, he added, noting that, from the get-go, it would help raise engagement for Disney+ titles with audiences outside of its predominant female and younger-skewing demographics.
“This deal is innovative and at its heart it lets me take some of our most iconic content for adults and put it in front of an audience who would typically not consider Disney+.
“ITVX skews relatively old, and our heartland is under-55s. One of the challenges we have is that our brands are strong, but if you’re older you think that Disney’s about family and kids.
“At the same time, we get some of the UK’s biggest shows to put in front of our audiences – which are less exposed to traditional free-to-air content. That’s great for engagement.”
Holmes said the deal would likely be the first of several deals with FTA broadcasters in other markets, with Disney+ in “active discussions”.
“The deals won’t be the same, ITV has made a particular success of ITVX in the UK and that shapes the arrangement somewhat,” he added. “But, in general, we believe free-to-air broadcasters aggregate the biggest audiences and have the biggest shows, and therefore we would expect [to do more deals] and are in active discussions to work with more broadcasters in more markets.”
A verison of this story first appeared on Screen’s sister site Broadcast
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