A (2:32)

I'm saying I'm less impressed.

B (2:33)

Probably. Probably the gravity thing had occurred to other people, but the panel.

A (2:36)

Exactly.

B (2:37)

You know, that might not have occurred to anyone else ever before.

A (2:40)

First person to write it down. It's a huge deal. So thank you, Mr. Fleming. I'll shut up now. Anyway, today's real topic, YouTube is the new king of all media. Says we search for Moffat Nicholson.

B (2:57)

All right.

A (2:57)

YouTube has surpassed Disney to become the world's Largest media company by revenue notes March Yahoo Finance article. YouTube made $62 billion in revenue last year. Total revenue research firm Moffitt Nathanson points out that it passed the Walt Disney Company's media business which made about $61 billion last year, excluding Disney's experiences division. Marissa, you just wrote about this milestone. How did this title swap occur?

C (3:32)

Well, I think there's a few factors at play. One, we do have to look at YouTube's kind of dominance in media overall user base wise, the kind of leads we see close to or approaching 3 billion users globally. We've noted that it's so big that it surpasses or matches other entire media categories. It's bigger than all subscription OTT viewers as a whole. So people are also spending more time with YouTube than they do with platforms like Netflix, Facebook, Instagram, who are also kind of thought to be kind of giants in this digital world. I think the reason behind this massive reach it has and the scale that it has now compared with Disney is looking at the broader shift to digital that we've seen in the past years or decades. Even many of Disney's media properties still rely on linear TV and traditional content and legacy media properties. YouTube in contrast to that is digital first. It has been one of the biggest drivers of digital adoption and, and I think there's also a point to be made that anyone can upload content on YouTube. It's great for user generated content, but that also means it has a breadth of content that pretty much no one can match because anyone can upload anything at any time. Disney's media business, in contrast to that, relies on a specific smaller number of high budget projects coming out every year. So I think the scale of what YouTube offers naturally leads to a wider audience where you can pretty much find anything you want.

A (5:16)

Yeah, yeah. That brings up questions of how can others compete, which we'll definitely get to. Ethan, what does YouTube achieving this new crown mean to you?

B (5:26)

Yeah, I mean there is no doubt that they deserve this crown and this title. If we are talking about reach and viewership to all to Marissa's points. Right. The numbers are absolutely indisputable. The scale of their viewership is unlike anything the world has ever seen. But I mean the reason you wrote

A (5:41)

about this in January, you had noted that they would been, they were the king of media in January in your report, a bunch of articles now once we got kind of the data in from how YouTube did in 2025. But you've been on this train.

B (5:54)

Yeah, yeah, well, but I wouldn't use the phrase king of all media, I would say king of all reach, that's for sure. Well over 250 million in the US and approaching 3 billion worldwide, which is just staggering and almost incomprehensible numbers. But I mean, the reason that YouTube is beating Disney's media operation is the same reason it's beating all of Disney's peer media operations, which is that YouTube is free and the others aren't. So I mean, this is becomes an almost an unfair comparison. And so when I see the claim that YouTube has become the king of all media because its revenue from that portion has exceeded Disney's revenue, I begin to scratch my head in terms of whether they really deserve that title. Because there's a company called Meta out there that is social media and it's going to have about four times as much revenue as YouTube is because their products are also free and they're going to have way, way, way, way, way, way, way, way more advertising than YouTube is going to have. So we have decided this, this Moffatt Nathan study has decided that YouTube is an over the top video entertainment platform, which is fine, I agree that it certainly is. But a very large chunk of its $60 billion in revenue can be associated with its social media elements. But we're, for some reason we're disqualifying social media when we want to make the point that how big YouTube is. But if we include social media, it's not that big at all. And it's actually one of the points we're going to get to later. By that measure, YouTube's revenue is actually surprisingly low. We would have thought that it would have been higher. So there, you know, this is, this is a debatable point, but I will not rain on the parade in terms of YouTube scope and scale and reach, which is absolutely staggering.

A (7:42)

Yeah, similar to me and Mr. Fleming, Ethan's not impressed. Our sister company. So yes, it depends on the context, right. Our sister company, Business Insider reporting YouTube made 40 billion in ad revenue in 2025, exceeding over so exceedingly less than 38 billion from its four closest competitors, Disney, Comcast, NBCU, Universal, Paramount, Skydance, and Warner Brothers Discovery. But so it's impressive. But to Ethan's point, if you compare that to Meta's revenue, it's about four times as little less impressive. There's a bunch of other milestones or markers in terms of it being the king of, of media. One of them. Marissa, you actually note that YouTube's the most popular media platform in the US control forecasting team based on minutes. So that's the marker we use.

C (8:37)

Yes.

A (8:37)

Okay.

C (8:37)

Yeah.

A (8:40)

So billions of 11.4 billion minutes. I think second place is matter. No, Netflix. Netflix is second with about 10 billion. And then, yeah, Facebook about five and a half. And I think Instagram and Tik Tok just behind that, their share of TV time. Given that they're, you know, given the reach that they have, maybe it's surprising. I don't know. Is it? What do you guys make of their 12? So Nielsen's gauge mark measures how many, how much where people spend their time with TV. YouTube's got 12.5 in the US of all TV time, including streaming and cable and all this stuff. 12.5% of all the time we spend, we spend watching TV is with YouTube. Netflix is second with 8.8. Surprised it's not bigger? I guess it's it.

B (9:32)

Go ahead, Marissa.

C (9:35)

I'm not necessarily surprised it's not bigger. I still think that's pretty notable given how many options people have to watch on their TV now. Yes, that YouTube still has a good share of, of the time spent watching TV and is above all these other platforms that are TV first experiences. Really. Like Netflix is kind of a TV first platform. You can watch on your laptop, but it's kind of associated with watching episodes and movies on TV. So that YouTube has really just short videos compared with like longer series that you would associate with tv. I think it's still a pretty notable number. Yeah.

A (10:15)

Yeah, that's a good point. Because Facebook there was the question, could it move to mobile? It did very well. And YouTube. Yeah, it wasn't TV first and it's become notably TV first. Half. Over half of YouTube viewership.

B (10:31)

Yeah, it is TV first. It's CTV first. Well over 70% of all YouTube viewers are now watching via CTV. And CTV is taking more time than mobile is, although only by a little bit. Okay, this becomes very. The time spent thing becomes very complicated. Now you're getting into my bailiwick because although YouTube is number one for sure, both among the population and among active users, it still trails regular television. So when, when we say it's leading, what we mean is it's leading among sort of media conglomerates. It's leading on a company level. So if you add up all of one company's media properties and another company's media properties, YouTube comes out on top. Although if, you know, if you add metas altogether, it becomes very close. And then Netflix, as you mentioned, is very, very high up there as well. And the rest are trailing by a Considerable level. But you know, traditional tv, from a marketing perspective, it's not necessarily valuable to break it up based on the companies that own the various networks, because the decision is usually whether or not to invest in TV or not in tv, you know, in tradition, you know, and how much money you're going to spend. You're not so much thinking about, well, this is, this network is owned by Disney and this network is owned by Comcast. You're thinking, how much am I going to put into television, how much am I going to put into live sports on television and how much am I going to put in digital and what type of digital and how much is going to social and how much is going to ott, et cetera, like that. So there's a bunch of different ways to think about it. But I do agree that, I mean YouTube, I, I understand I came out hot, you know, criticizing Moffat Nathanson for acting like YouTube is just an OTT video platform. But that is how people are treating it now. Undoubtedly. But the advertising is a lot more mixed. Right? I just mentioned that 70% plus and most of the time is now going to YouTube, CTV. But ad dollars don't reflect that. Only like 40% of their ad revenue is coming from CTV. The rest is still heavily mobile. Which again is sort of how YouTube is also still social media. I mean, you know, if you consider what YouTube is on a mobile phone to be a stand in for using it like social media. And if you consider watching YouTube on CTV to be a stand in for its competitiveness with Disney and the like, then you get a real mixed picture. Most of its money is still coming from the mobile device. And you know, things like, think about shorts. This is, YouTube itself is emphasizing shorts as its sort of revenue generating wave of the future. And that is clearly designed to be social media and to compete with social media, which is somewhat ironic since everybody else is trying to compete with YouTube on CTV because that actually is probably the higher ceiling. But yeah, this is a mixed conversation. If I was Disney, I would also, when I look at that headline, I'd say, wait a minute, yeah, is it really YouTube?

A (13:24)

Yeah, they, it really does depend how you, on how you look at this because in the US at 12.5% of all TV, that's more than Disney, Paramount, Tubi, Peacock and Warner Brothers Discovery combined. If they were all one service. People watch more YouTube on the online televisions in the U.S. it was interesting. Even your report just discusses the, the number that Marissa mentioned at the beginning. The 2.8 billion YouTube people around the world. And you look at a bunch of different countries in terms of YouTube's penetration. It's high in North America and a lot of developed countries, and it is high across the world. But there's still so much room for growth in some of these other countries. They're not nearly at kind of the 80, 90% that you're seeing in the developed markets.

B (14:18)

Right. So, I mean, there's a strong chance if we came back five years from now and had this exact same conversation, I would have nothing to say. Because by then, you know, YouTube could be so overwhelmingly, ludicrously dominant. Yeah. That there is absolutely no doubt in the world. However, you know, its competitors are going to be doing things too.

C (14:35)

Right.

B (14:35)

And I think we're going to talk about that.

A (14:37)

Yeah, let's. Let's talk about that now. So, Marissa, you wrote that YouTube's unmatched scale is pushing media rivals like Netflix, Prime Video and Disney to catch up. What strategy strategies do you think are most likely to help its competitors, like those folks or others, to catch up with YouTube?

C (14:54)

Yeah, I don't believe that there's one single strategy that will help competitors catch up. I don't think pushing into like we're seeing Netflix push into not only video podcasts that will draw in creators and maybe their audiences, but they're also pushing into a vertical video format. Disney plus is experience experimenting with vertical videos as well. But I don't think one step is going to kind of meaningfully close that gap. I think that one investing in multiple different formats that YouTube is already dominating in will be important. But I think beyond that, even if you have all these different formats, you're not going to gain dominance if you can't prove your results. If you're looking to attract more ad dollars, which YouTube is as well as we've kind of touched on. But if you're looking to boost revenues through ads, you have to prove that these new initiatives drive actual results. Because if Netflix has video podcasts now, yeah, that's a cool offering. But if it doesn't do anything for brands, then why invest in that when YouTube is more established in that way with creators?

A (16:06)

Mm. Yeah. Also, how much is it growing the audience? I mean, the engagement, you know, could it. It could help. But it's kind of amazing when you look at all the different subscription businesses that YouTube's managed to. To build up. YouTube, premium, YouTube Music, NFL Sunday Ticket, YouTube TV. There's regular YouTube, obviously. And so, yeah, there's. They've amassed quite, quite a following across

C (16:34)

all These different platforms, I think kind of going off that point, beyond gaining and proving results for advertisers, you have to actually offer something that's going to draw in audiences because, okay, it's cool. Disney plus Netflix now have Vertical videos, but why would I choose to watch those when I can watch TikTok or YouTube shorts? It's cool that they have podcasts now, but YouTube has more podcasts, so why would I? What is meaningfully different is what they'll have to prove to really draw in audience interest.

A (17:05)

Yeah, these, all these strategies, Ethan, are quite interesting because no one, at least for now, opens up Netflix to watch podcasts. You open up Netflix, you're watching other things. All those podcasts. I'll try them. Similarly, with Vertical Video, no one's opening up a Disney app to watch Vertical Video. You're watching something else. Oh, it's there. I'll try it. What do you make of some of these strategies from some of its competitors to try to catch up with YouTube? Futile.

B (17:26)

Yeah, it was jarring for me just recently when I opened Netflix for the first time. And on my homepage and the recommended feed, there was just popular podcast stuff. And some of it I recognize because of course they know me and somehow it's algorithmically connected. And these, they've cut this deal with Spotify. So there's my Spotify podcasts waiting for me on Netflix. But it doesn't strike me as a needle mover because that's just more content. And frankly, it's their talk shows, right? It's no longer a podcast now. It's just, here's a section of Netflix that has talk shows and they're your favorite podcasts. And okay, sure, maybe I will click on that. I, I won't say that I won't click on it, but it just feels like just more content on Netflix. And that's what they need to do. They need to keep going on that. But none of these people, not Disney, Netflix, none of them are going to really actually compete or they're never going to catch. They're never really going to compete with YouTube on total viewership and reach unless they do something radical like dramatically lower their prices or become free. That's just not going to happen. And I don't think that's the goal. So I don't think anyone is sitting around in any of these companies saying, we need to have as many viewers as YouTube, because obviously, why would that ever happen when you have to pay for one and you don't have to pay for the other? Which again goes back to the real competitor on that side is Instagram and Facebook and TikTok. But let's say they're not necessarily competing for raw viewership and raw reach. They're instead, as Marissa was saying, they're competing for ad dollars. They're competing for becoming the most attractive option for marketers. And in many ways, YouTube's competitors are already succeeding. Which gets back to the other point about why YouTube isn't actually bigger. Its ad business is not growing all that fast compared to basically everyone else we've mentioned. Right. So Netflix already is doing something right. Netflix's ad revenue is growing much, much quicker than YouTube's. Disney plus ad revenue is growing much quicker than YouTube. Of course they have. They're far behind. They have a long way to go. But all of the social media platforms are also growing more quickly than YouTube. Basically every major ad digital ad revenue generator platform in the world is growing more quickly than YouTube. So they're already all doing something right because they are drawing more stuff now. YouTube is not doing badly. I don't want anyone to think that. That's what I'm saying. They're still growing, you know, 10, 15% revenue per year, but that is, that's trailing most of their major competitors. So that, that dynamic, I mean, if I was, if I was a YouTube competitor, I'd say, well, we already are on the right track.

A (19:58)

I was trying to think of so much positive to say about YouTube, especially in this moment with these milestones. Another one I was reading about is the market value. Alex Weprin of the Hollywood Reporter noting, MOFFAT Nathanson valued YouTube at between 500 to 560 billion. That's way ahead traditional media companies. And the closest is Netflix, around 400 with mark cap. So there's so many ways, even if you look at our forecast across, you know, penetration, like what do people in America use, what kind of media property YouTube is way out in front. Netflix kind of 75% Netflix a distant second in 62, Facebook, Instagram, and you keep going back, back, back quite quickly. So I was trying to think what things are they not doing so well? What could trip them up?

B (20:43)

One of them, I don't dispute that valuation at all. I don't know where he came up with that number. But certainly on pure sort of market cap, if YouTube was an independent company, which it isn't, but if it was, sure, just because that reach, right, the potential monetization is just staggering. And the fact that they haven't quite cracked the code is what is sort of mysterious or the challenge for the leadership there, because they should be generating so much more than they have. And I think maybe even all of us as YouTube viewers have experienced the suboptimal nature of some of that ad experience on YouTube. Right. It cuts in. It's a pain in the butt. Everybody hates it. You're watching a video and someone's in the middle of a sentence and suddenly there's an ad. Right. They're about to deliver a line of a joke and suddenly there's an ad. You're an action sequence and suddenly there's an ad. Right. They haven't figured it out in the way that Amazon has figured it out. Obviously, they haven't figured out in the way that meta has figured it out. But if you're just doing a raw valuation, you look at 3 billion viewers and you say, well, maybe in the future they will figure it out. Yeah, this will become as fluid an ad environment as its competitors. Well, yeah, I mean, the potential is gargantuan.

A (21:48)

Yeah. Sleeping giant, kind of like WhatsApp. There's such a huge amount of people using it. If you can figure out the monetization piece and turn those taps on and

B (21:55)

if you want one more positive to say it's also their subscription business, I think it's probably done even better than people thought it was going to do. Yes, that's. That's a huge. I don't know, I can't remember exactly. Maybe Marissa can remember. I can't remember exactly what percentage of that. That 60 billion. But a surprisingly large percentage of it is people paying for.

A (22:11)

I think they. 20 of the 60. I think it's 20 of the 4. 20 is subscription. 40 AD.

B (22:17)

Yeah. So that's a whole lot right there. So YouTube TV we know about here, that's doing better probably than a lot of people thought. But then especially I think just subscribing to YouTube Premium and people are really into it and that's probably to get rid of the ads, frankly.

A (22:29)

Yeah.

B (22:29)

But still they're doing well.

A (22:31)

Moffat Nathanson was saying that the YouTube TV service, about 10 million subscribers, that could soon overtake pay TV leaders Charter and Comcast. So it's. Yeah, it's not nothing by any stretch. So really quickly, I mean, you were saying YouTube is still. You writing YouTube is still a top destination for video ad dollars, but it's losing ground. You're basically talking about the share because they're not growing.

B (22:53)

I was talking about the overall share of, you know, digital ad spending worldwide and then video ad spending because video first, platforms like TikTok are shooting past it.

A (23:04)

Right.

B (23:04)

But Moffat, Nathan wasn't counting TikTok.

A (23:06)

Yeah, Marissa, anything from you in terms of what could. What could trip them up? They're so big. Once the company gets this big, you start thinking maybe antitrust or doesn't seem like a competitor is going to knock them off the perch. Anything you're paying attention to in terms of potential struggles for YouTube down the road?

C (23:26)

I mean, I think the big struggle is just that competition in this space is only going. It's only going to become more saturated. Even if other platforms don't command the same attention, YouTube does. People's attention is going to somewhat fragment across all these different competitors. YouTube replicas as people like. Or companies like Netflix are doing, looking to kind of mimic YouTube's offerings. It might not be as successful, but that is still a portion of people who might say, oh, I'm just going to spend my time on Netflix. I already pay for it, and this is just kind of a benefit. So I really think there's not too much threatening YouTube right now. There's a potential for it as the space becomes more saturated. But I do think it's going to kind of hold this position for the foreseeable future.

B (24:17)

One risk is if they get classified as social media by legal institutions around the world and then are subject to childhood bans or teen controls or blah, blah, blah, whatever is going to happen, whatever is happening to the pure play social media companies, that's a risk. I feel like they're going to dodge that, but that's definitely a risk.

C (24:37)

I think so, too.

A (24:38)

Yeah. Yeah. Officially and officially in the courts, real courts, in the court of public opinion, if they, you know, social media to, to the courts, they're going to say, all right, now, you know, young people can't. Can't use them for a certain age. And whereas if just in the public, if people are saying, oh, because people starting to get a bit of a bad taste in the mouth about social media and how much they're spending, how much time they're spending on these platforms, et cetera, et cetera, and they've been able to, you know, disguise or dress up as we're video. Actually, don't, don't put us over there with those guys.

B (25:11)

We're educational.

A (25:13)

Yes.

C (25:14)

We have YouTube kids.

A (25:15)

Yeah, exactly. How long can that last? We'll see. That's what we have time for for this episode. Thank you so much to my guests today. Thank you to Ethan.

B (25:23)

Thanks for having me, of course.

A (25:24)

And to Marissa.

C (25:25)

Thank you it's always a pleasure.

A (25:27)

Yes, indeed. Thanks to the whole production crew, we've got Danny and Luigi helping out with this one. Thank you to you guys. Thanks everyone, for listening to buying the Numbers in the Market podcast made possible by Rocked. We'll be back on Monday, of course, Happiest of weekends.