HBO Max Launches in UK at £4.99, Eyes 6M Subs
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- HBO Max launched in the UK last week at £4.99/month with ads, undercutting Netflix, Disney+ and Paramount+ by £1, with a no-ads tier at £9.99 or £5.99 including new film releases.
- Warner Bros Discovery is bundling HBO Max through Sky for £24/month alongside Netflix, Disney+ and Hayu, marking a shift from its previous exclusive relationship with Sky that had blocked a UK standalone launch.
- Harry Potter is the central bet — the TV series was pulled forward from 2026 to Christmas 2025, and Ampere Analysis head Matt Trickett calls it the first major piece of exclusive IP WBD owns outside its Sky deal.
- Ampere Analysis forecasts HBO Max will reach 6.06 million UK subscribers by end-2026, placing it fourth behind Netflix (18.59M), Amazon Prime Video (12.65M) and Disney+ (8.04M).
- WBD is moving all its sports content onto HBO Max, including Olympics streaming rights through 2032 and TNT Sports' Premier League and Champions League coverage, and is offering direct-sign-up bundles it says save £60-£131 in year one.
- Paramount Skydance's $110bn acquisition of WBD could merge HBO Max with Paramount+, adding franchises like Mission Impossible, Top Gun, Transformers and Star Trek — a consolidation that would also offset WBD's loss of Champions League UK TV rights to Paramount from 2027.
- UK streaming growth has collapsed from 37% year-on-year in 2020 to 7% in 2024, and would have been below 5% this year without HBO Max's arrival, per Ampere data cited in the report.
Why it matters: HBO Max is entering a saturated, slow-growth UK market where the only way to gain ground is bundling with former rivals — Sky's £24 package with Netflix and Disney+ is the template. With 6 million projected subscribers, it becomes a meaningful fourth player, but the Paramount Skydance takeover could soon fold it into a Paramount+ merger, reshaping the UK streaming landscape within months.
