NBCUniversal’s Streaming Service Peacock Records 10 Million Sign Ups in 2 Weeks

Two weeks ago, Comcast’s NBCUniversal launched its streaming service ‘Peacock’ in the US. Today, the company has announced that it has signed up 10 million accounts. The numbers include those who registered with Peacock when it rolled out just to Comcast pay-TV customers in April as well as new members who’ve signed up since its national launch July 15. 

It is a welcome development for the streaming service comparing its feat with that of  Disney Plus which reported more than 10 million sign-ups in little more than 24 hours when it launched in November and HBO Max — the premium cable network’s newer, bigger app that rolled out at the end of May which signed up 4.1 million accounts in its first month. 

Comcast said Peacock’s 10 million milestone was more than it foresaw. 

Jeff Shell, the CEO of NBCUniversal, said Thursday during a conference call to discuss Comcast’s second-quarter earnings, “Across the board, we’re better than expectations.

 “We didn’t expect this many sign-ups, we didn’t expect people to come back as frequently as they’re coming back and we didn’t expect people to watch as long as they’re watching once they come back.”

As a metric, sign-ups means people who have registered with the service, regardless of whether they’re still using it. 

Peacock was the last big new service to roll out in the so-called streaming wars when a flood of services spilled out from tech and media giants over a roughly nine-month period.

 Peacock is unique among the new crop of competitors in offering a free tier, which lets anyone in the US watch about two-thirds of the catalog with advertising. It also had paid memberships: You can unlock the full library of shows and movies for a price for $4.99 a month plus ads, and a $9.99-a-month upgrade makes the service mostly ad-free.