More than 1 million people, at least according to a newly released analyst report, may have migrated from Netflix to Disney+ last month.
Per the Hollywood Reporter, the estimates from a Cowen & Co. report suggest that Netflix "lost 1.1 million subscribers to Disney+" in November. The company polled 2,500 consumers in the U.S., with 21 percent of those surveyed stating they had signed up for a Disney+ subscription.
An estimated 5.8 percent of Netflix subscribers are suggested to have canceled their subscriptions after signing up for Disney's service, while an estimated 19.4 million of those polled are described as "dual subscribers" accounting for an 80 percent overlap between Netflix and Disney+.
Netflix, however, is—quite understandably—not really sweating any of this. Not only does a reported subscriber move not signify anything that's necessarily permanent (i.e. those same people could easily sign up for Netflix again), but Netflix has also been dealing with other forms of competition for years now.
"So, fundamentally, there is not a big change here," Netflix CEO Reed Hastings said during a recent earnings call, perTHR. "All of us are competing with linear TV and we're all relatively small to linear TV." Hastings also pointed to competition like Amazon Prime, YouTube, and Hulu.
An early boost to Disney+'s success, of course, has been the largely excellent Star Wars series The Mandalorian. Breakout star Baby Yoda has subsequently enjoyed the dual glories of near-constant memeification and a popular petition calling for Apple to make some new emoji in the tiny hero’s honor.
