Combined Disney Plus and Hulu App Set for Beta Launch in December

Summary

Disney announced the launch of a beta version of the merged app including Hulu and Disney Plus next month, while the official launch of the app is in Spring 2024.

Hulu and Disney users can now access a variety of content, both from Hulu and Disney, under one single app. This plan has been in the blueprint for a year, as it was expected to be executed in late 2023. With the full acquisition of Hulu by Disney, many changes were made, including the merged app, which is now in the works.

Disney CEO Bob Iger shared the plans for the combined app when the Q2 earnings were shared with the world. Saying, “The advertising potential of this combined platform is incredibly exciting,” Iger also mentioned that this plan will only be for US customers for now.

While there’s a potential opportunity for more DTC advantages, the eligibility criteria of the app are still unclear. This newly merged app will also only be available to those who are subscribed to both services and/or are subscribed to Disney Bundle. This is what the CEO of Disney said:

“We remain on track to roll out a more unified one-app experience domestically, making extensive general entertainment content available to bundle subscribers via Disney Plus,”

When this one-app-experience was first mentioned in May 2023, there has been a lot going on for Disney even now. Since the appointment of Bob Iger as the CEO, Disney’s effort and time spent a lot on fixing this and that. After purchasing the remaining stakes of Hulu, Disney is now in control of Hulu, and can safely execute the single app experience.

As Iger stated:

“We expect that Hulu and Disney Plus will result in increased engagement, greater advertising opportunities, lower churn, and reduce customer acquisition costs.”

This integration of Hulu into the Disney Plus app is apparently going to be better in all aspects. Viewers can expect a variety of shows under one app, like Ahsoka and The Other Black Girl. Plus, from the advertising and customer subscription aspect, it is profitable, because you pay less for more content. Along with the ‘pause ads’ feature, which literally uses a static picture of a product to appear on the screen whenever a viewer pauses their video, this merging is seen as extremely beneficial.

As for how it is going to look, we can wait on that. Because it’s not long till Spring 2024 when the official launch of the combined app will roll out. It is entirely going to be depending on how well the beta version performed.

The users still get to pay differently for each service as they have done now, except for the Disney Bundle plan, where you get both services.

We look forward to hearing your thoughts on this. Let us know what you think of the combined Disney Plus and Hulu app.