Friends – Warner Brothers
The news we expected has finally arrived regarding the future of Friends on Netflix. Friends is going to be leaving Netflix on January 1st, 2020 and remain away from a streaming service up until Spring 2020 when it’ll launch on the newly announced HBO Max platform.
We’ve known Friends is potentially going to be leaving Netflix for quite some time. The first news came at the end of 2018 when the series showed up to be removed from January 1st, 2019. It was eventually renewed for a reported $80 billion for the year.
Now, thanks to the revealing of HBO Max, Warner Medias streaming service we know that Friends is definitely leaving Netflix in 2020.
Given the contract for Friends gets renewed every January 1st we’ll see the show removed on January 1st, 2020. The series was first added to Netflix in the United States back in January 2015.
Netflix tweeted soon after the news broken on WSJ. Here’s how it followed up the news:
The One Where We Have To Say Goodbye. We’re sorry to see Friends go to Warner’s streaming service at the beginning of 2020 (in The US). Thanks for the memories, gang.
Of course, it’s not the only show or movies leaving Netflix soon. Disney has ended its deal with Netflix and will see Disney movies slowly removed Netflix over the next couple of years. NBC is also notably removing The Office from Netflix come 2021.
Some have speculated this could spell the end of Netflix but the reality is although those two shows are extremely popular, it could be argued their popularity have heightened because of their residency on Netflix.
Also, subscribers will have to choose whether they now want to spend the reported $15-18 a month on HBO Max. Not to mention, the reported $10 for NBC’s service and $6.99 for Disney+.
One important point is that this is all very localized to the United States at the moment. Netflix’s accounts in other regions have been clear that Friends remains on their services for the meantime. Warner Media is only currently planning on launching its new service in the US at present.
The one where I go cry till January 1, 2020
— julia🖤 (@_julianoone) July 9, 2019
That means this Christmas will be the final chance to binge through all the Friends Christmas episodes on Netflix which we’ve picked out and put into a playlist here.
Will Friends leaving Netflix make you reconsider your Netflix subscription let us know in the comments.
