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YouTube TV Flexes Muscles Again in Showdown With Disney
The Google-owned pay-TV service also is in a dispute with Univision
By
Joe Flint
Oct. 30, 2025 - 5:30 am EDT
YouTube TV has become an 800-pound gorilla in the media business. Its negotiations with Disney could test how much power it really holds.
The parent company of ABC, ESPN and FX could be on the verge of having its networks go dark on Google’s YouTube TV, the pay-TV platform that, with a growing base of about 10 million subscribers,
has amassed considerable clout in its dealings with major media companies.
The current agreement between the two companies expires at midnight Thursday and, if a new pact isn’t reached, customers could lose access to lots of college and pro sports as well as sitcoms and dramas such as “Abbott Elementary” and “Grey’s Anatomy.”
Disney is the latest media conglomerate to find itself in a showdown with YouTube TV. Over the past several weeks, YouTube TV has had carriage skirmishes with Comcast’s NBCUniversal and Fox Corp., and it is still in a tense battle with Spanish-language broadcaster TelevisaUnivision.
Issues YouTube and Disney are confronting include the fees Disney wants YouTube TV to pay for ESPN and other channels.
YouTube TV is also seeking shorter-term deals with programmers, people who have negotiated with the Google unit say. Typically programming contracts last three to five years. YouTube TV is asking for deals that run one or two years, the people said.
Distributors usually prefer to lock in long-term deals with programmers so they know what their costs will be for several years.
But programmers say YouTube TV wants shorter deals because it will soon have more leverage over entertainment companies given the pace of its growth. Larger distributors often can negotiate lower rates than what smaller pay-TV providers pay.
YouTube TV is already seeking rates similar to what bigger distributors Comcast and Charter pay, which irritates programmers, some of the people familiar with the matter said.
Squabbles
between distributors and programmers are commonplace and occasionally lead to short-term channel disruptions.
Many distributors are trying to keep programming costs down in an effort to lessen the financial blow of cord-cutting. At the same time, programmers are spending heavily on content, particularly sports, leading them to seek higher fees from distributors.
But YouTube TV is in a different position.
Unlike cable and satellite operators such as Comcast, Charter and DirecTV, which have lost millions of subscribers over the past several years, YouTube TV is growing at a fast clip. Already the third-biggest distributor, YouTube TV is expected to be the largest within the next few years, according to analyst projections.
YouTube’s main on-demand video platform also accounts for a significant amount of U.S. TV viewing time, according to Nielsen data, making it a top competitor for eyeballs.
Disney and other programmers say it is their content that makes YouTube TV desirable, and they should be paid accordingly.
“We invest significantly in our content and expect our partners to pay fair rates that recognize that value,” Disney said in a statement.
Programmers have balked at what they see as YouTube TV flexing its muscles in negotiations as its market position expands.
As negotiations intensified between NBCU and YouTube TV, the Comcast-owned media company said, “Google, with its $3 trillion market cap, already controls what Americans see online through search and ads—now it wants to control what we watch.”
NBCU and YouTube TV resolved the matter with a new deal earlier this month, avoiding a blackout of channels including NBC, Bravo and MSNBC.
When Fox was tangling with YouTube TV in August, Fox said Google “continually exploits its outsized influence by proposing terms that are out of step with the marketplace.” Fox and YouTube TV also settled the matter before channels went dark.
YouTube TV has countered that it is only trying to keep subscription prices low and avoid deals that would disadvantage it against competitors, which include streaming services owned by NBCU and Disney.
As part of its dispute with TelevisaUnivision, YouTube TV proposed cutting the programmer from its basic offering of channels, instead offering it in a more expensive specialty tier. TelevisaUnivision says that amounts to a
“Hispanic tax” and is unfair to a channel that serves a fast-growing audience. Other major distributors offer Univision alongside popular English-language channels.
President Trump weighed in on his Truth Social platform, urging YouTube TV to restore TelevisaUnivision, which has been off the service since the start of October. The issue came up during a Senate Commerce Committee hearing Wednesday with Sen. Ben Ray Luján (D., N.M.) confronting Google executives.
YouTube TV says its viewership data doesn’t support keeping the service in its most popular package of channels. TelevisaUnivision disputes this.
YouTube TV has also clashed with programmers that own streaming services it says are selling content at lower prices to viewers than what it is being asked to pay. That was a sticking point in YouTube TV’s dealings with NBCU, which owns Peacock, YouTube TV said.
Another area of contention is how YouTube TV offers access to streaming services. YouTube TV would rather offer streaming services through its Primetime Channels service, which lets users subscribe to the services as add-ons through its app. Programmers want YouTube to act as a gateway for users to subscribe to the services directly.
MoffettNathanson analyst Michael Nathanson said the media industry is “trying to have its cake and eat it too” by aiming to preserve its traditional businesses while also building streaming services.
“I don’t blame YouTube TV for trying this,” Nathanson said “They will be the biggest in town and have the best tech.”
Write to Joe Flint at
Joe.Flint@wsj.com
