This week YouTube announced “Primetime Channels” a new storefront hub featuring 34 subscription streaming services available directly on the platform, including Paramount+, Showtime, AMC+ and Spanish-language Vix+.
“We are excited to expand our partnership with YouTube to offer customers of Paramount+ another way to stream the content they love,” says Jeff Shultz, Paramount Streaming’s chief strategy officer and business development officer, in a statement. “This new feature gives us the opportunity to expand our presence on YouTube, broadening our reach and giving consumers even more choice when it comes to streaming the best in entertainment.”
Each streaming service will have a curated home page and videos, very similar to the classic YouTube channel layout.
These videos — shows, movies, trailers, behind-the-scenes footage, and filmmaker interviews — will appear in the Movies and TV section of the YouTube app as well as in search results, recommendations, and other spaces on the platform.
View counts will not be represented, but subscribers will be able to comment and like or dislike videos.
The Google-owned company has previously offered a minor selection of premium channels via YouTube TV, its pay-TV service. Now these Primetime Channels will be available to anyone using the platform — two billion people and counting.
“You’ll watch trailers on YouTube and leave YouTube to go start from scratch on the streaming service,” Erin Teague, the head of sports, movies, and shows at YouTube and the leader of the Primetime Channels project, told The Verge. “So we were like, ‘What would happen if we just collapsed that experience and made it convenient to watch all this content in one place?’”
Primetime Channels is currently only available to U.S. users. YouTube says it will eventually have additional services to purchase through the platform, like NBA League Pass, with plans to launch the service internationally.
Some major streaming services were not included in the company’s recent statement, including Disney+, Netflix, Hulu and HBO Max.
