Streaming Residuals Fall for First Time: WGA Report
Get the Culture newsletter
Daily culture — film, music, books, the trends and ideas worth your attention. Free.
- Writers Guild of America data shows streaming residuals dropped to $330.7 million in 2025 from $346.6 million in 2024, the first nominal decline in the category
- Total residuals have fallen 18% from their 2022 inflation-adjusted peak to $535.5 million in 2025, per the WGA's July report
- "Made for streaming" residuals grew to $77.8 million in 2025, but growth has slowed to 13% per year post-strike versus 38% per year from 2020-23, despite a 2023 contract formula expected to boost the category by 21%
- Writers' up-front earnings have fallen 24.5% since 2022 while the number of writers reporting earnings has dropped 27%, as platforms cut back on scripted programming
- Global streaming revenues are projected to grow from $78 billion in 2024 to $88 billion in 2025 with industry profits recovering, per a separate February WGA report — even as residuals and writer employment contract
- WGA is the only major guild that publicly releases residual data; SAG-AFTRA, the Directors Guild of America, and IATSE do not break out comparable figures
Why it matters: Writers are losing income from both ends — streaming residuals fell for the first time and up-front earnings dropped 24.5% since 2022 — while the WGA's own prior data shows global streaming revenues climbing toward $88 billion. The divergence suggests the post-2022 streaming pullback is shifting dollars to platform owners and away from the freelance workforce whose 2023 strike won structural changes that have so far underdelivered.
