What Streaming Buyers Are Actually Acquiring: How to Read Catalog Changes for Licensing and Sales

Reelgood bar chart of the largest year-over-year genre changes across major streaming catalogs, 2025 to 2026, showing gains and declines by service.

Over the past few months I have sat in on a string of conversations with content strategy, acquisition, and sales leaders at production companies and independent distributors. The companies could not have been more different: a Canadian studio selling scripted series into Europe, a mid-size studio building a slate for underrepresented audiences, an indie distributor…

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The Distribution Arc: How Long Does It Take a Hit Film to Go Free?

Infographic showing four key statistics from Reelgood's analysis of 7,966 popular films: 9.4-month median time to free streaming, 57% faster window compression since 2020, 2.5-month median for 2025 releases, and 7,966 titles analyzed.

Reelgood analyzed 1.93 million availability windows across 240 platforms (US market) to quantify the streaming industry’s best-kept open secret: the windowing clock is accelerating, and the data tells a different story than most licensing teams assume. Key Takeaways The median time from a popular movie’s first paid availability to its first free/AVOD appearance is 9.4…

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