With commercials, Disney Plus will keep the breaks to four minutes every hour

When Disney Plus’ ad-supported option launches later this year, it will reportedly display adverts for four minutes on movies or episodes lasting an hour or less.

This would require Disney to provide fewer advertisements per hour than some of its competitors. NBC’s Peacock broadcasts no more than five minutes of advertising per hour of content, whereas HBO Max shows four minutes per hour. Disney Plus’ anticipated number of advertisements exceeds that of Disney-owned Hulu, which runs anywhere from nine to twelve spots each hour.

In terms of the commercials’ content, the corporation is apparently treading carefully in order to maintain its family-friendly reputation. Disney isn’t only removing commercials with mature themes, such as those about alcohol or politics.

Disney stated in March that it would debut a cheaper, ad-supported version in the United States in late 2022, with other countries following suit the following year. There is no information on how much the less expensive version will cost – Disney Plus is now $7.99 per month without advertisements. According to Disney, it added 7.9 million new members in the fourth quarter, bringing its total subscriber base in the United States and Canada to over 44 million individuals.

Netflix’s membership base is shrinking as Disney Plus grows (despite still sitting at 74.58 million subscribers in the US and Canada). Last quarter, the streaming behemoth lost subscribers for the first time in more than a decade, and it has already created a few strategies to regain them. According to an internal memo, Netflix may launch an ad-supported tier this year, and it is also working on a live streaming option, similar to Disney Plus. Netflix co-CEO Reed Hastings has hinted about cracking down on password sharing in order to capitalize on streaming freeloaders (much to the chagrin of customers), which could happen around the same time Netflix launches an ad-supported tier.