If you were wondering where the HBO Max shows went that Warner Bros. Discovery took away from the streaming service, we now have some answers.
According to Variety, Warner Bros. Discovery has struck a deal with Roku and Tubi to bring some of its shows and movies to their free ad-supported streaming television (FAST) channels. Warner had hinted at this move back in December in a press email titled "HBO Max Content Moving to FAST," but this is the first official announcement regarding which FAST partners will be showing HBO Max shows.
HBO FAST: What’s coming to Roku
Roku’s FAST service — The Roku Channel — is set to get Warner Bros. Discovery channels in the spring of this year. These channels will include a wide variety of content from across the company’s portfolio of networks, including The Bachelor, Cake Boss, Say Yes to the Dress, F-Boy Island and the critically acclaimed HBO series Westworld.
But that’s not all that’s coming to The Roku Channel. In addition to these aforementioned shows, Roku will also be adding around 2,000 hours of on-demand content from hundreds of TV shows and movies in the vast Warner Bros. Discovery catalog. Variety states that this content will be sourced from, “HBO, HBO Max, Discovery Channel, HGTV, Food Network, TLC, Warner Bros. Pictures, Warner Bros. Television and more.”
HBO FAST: What’s coming to Tubi
The details of Tubi’s partnership with Warner Bros. Discovery are a bit more concrete. Tubi, a free streaming service owned by Fox, is adding, “14 WB-branded FAST channels and more than 225 ad-supported VOD titles.” That will bring over 2,000 hours of free ad-supported content to Tubi, which feels like a massive win for the platform.
The new WBD content is set to begin launching on Tubi as early as tomorrow (Feb. 1) with the full rollout likely taking the entire month of February. Below is a list of everything confirmed to be coming to Tubi as part of this deal:
- WB TV Series: premium TV shows series including “Westworld,” “Raised by Wolves,” “The Nevers,” and “The Time Traveler’s Wife”
- WB TV Reality: unscripted TV series including “Legendary,” “FBoy Island” and “Finding Magic Mike”
- WB TV Family: a collection of “family-friendly” series including “Head of the Class”
- WB TV Sweet Escapes: baking competition shows including “Cake Boss,” “Extreme Cake Makers” and “Cake Wars”
- WB TV Paws & Claws: pet shows including “Dogs 101” and “My Cat from Hell”
- WB TV Slice of Life: series following people from “all corners of the world” including “Extreme Couponing,” “Breaking Amish” and “My Big Fat Gypsy Wedding”
- WB TV Welcome Home: Real estate and interior design shows including “Caribbean Life,” “Buying Hawaii,” and “Bahamas Life”
- WB TV At the Movies: Selection of classic films from the ‘70s, ‘80s and ‘90s
- WB TV How To: “curiosity-inspiring” series including “How It’s Made,” “How to Build Everything” and “How the Earth Works”
- WB TV Supernatural: shows including “Ghost Brothers,” “Paranormal Lockdown” and “Ghost Asylum”
- WB TV Crime Series: shows including “Murder Chose Me,” “A Crime to Remember,” and “Murder Comes to Town”
- WB TV Mysteries: shows like “Mysteries at the Museum,” “Mysteries at the Monument” and “Off Limits”
- WB TV Love & Marriage: shows including “Say Yes to the Dress Atlanta,” “Four Weddings” and “A Wedding Story”
- WB TV Family Rules: series about real-life families including “Long Lost Family,” “The Little Couple” and “My Five Wives”
- WB TV Keeping It Real: Reality shows including “The Bachelor,” “The Bachelorette,” “Bachelor in Paradise,” “Finding Magic Mike” and “Fboy Island”
- WB TV All Together: shows with “characters who feel like family” including “Eight Is Enough,” “Better With You” and “Head of the Class”
HBO FAST: A major win for free TV
Ultimately, these deals feel like a major win for Roku, Tubi and FAST services in general. This is “prestige TV” for free — even if it’s all older content. This could give these services a huge content advantage over other FAST services such as Viacom’s Pluto TV or Amazon’s freevee, which are two of the more popular services in the nascent FAST market.
It’s also a major win for people looking to cut the cord for cheap, as you now get hundreds — nay, thousands — of hours of content that you don’t need to pay or share a password to watch. That’s a major selling point for choosing one of the best free streaming services when paid streaming services like Netflix are cracking down on password sharing.
