In a move that further intensifies the reflection of the cable business it's slowly killing, Netflix will start showing broadcast channels next summer.
The world’s largest streaming provider announced today that starting next year, all Netflix subscribers in France will be able to watch broadcast channels from TF1 Group, France’s biggest commercial broadcaster, which also owns streaming services and creates content. Financial Times (FT) reported that users will be able to watch all five TF1 linear channels.
Netflix’s French customers will also gain access to “more than 30,000 hours” of on-demand TF1 content in the summer of 2026, FT reported. TF1’s content selection includes scripted dramas, reality shows like The Voice, and live sports.
Before this announcement, Netflix and TF1 were already “creative partners,” according to Netflix, and co-produced titles like Les Combattantes, a French historical miniseries whose title translates to Women at War.
The companies didn’t disclose financial details of the deal.
Traditional media’s unlikely savior
In a statement, Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters highlighted the TF1 deal as a driver of subscriber engagement, a focus that Netflix will increasingly emphasize with investors following its recent decision to stop sharing subscriber counts. Netflix claims to have “over” 300 million subscribers.
“By teaming up with France’s leading broadcaster, we will provide French consumers with even more reasons to come to Netflix every day and to stay with us for all their entertainment,” Peters said.
Meanwhile, TF1 gains advertising opportunities, as the commercials its channels show will likely attract more eyeballs in the form of Netflix subscribers.
"As viewing habits shift toward on-demand consumption and audience fragmentation increases, this unprecedented alliance will enable our premium content to reach unparalleled audiences and unlock new reach for advertisers within an ecosystem that perfectly complements our TF1+ [streaming] platform,” Rodolphe Belmer, CEO of TF1 Group, said in a statement.
Netflix also has the opportunity to grow its French audience with the deal. TF1 Group’s broadcast channels have 58 million viewers per month, and its streaming service, TF1+, has 35 million users per month, according to FT. Netflix, meanwhile, has over 10 million French subscribers, Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos said in 2022.
In 2021, the French government ordered Netflix and other streaming services to invest 20 to 25 percent of revenue generated in France to French content. This deal could also help Netflix fulfill its obligations there.
If it proves successful, Netflix and TF1’s partnership could unlock the door for more linear channels to air on streaming services, including in other parts of Europe and in the US. For Netflix's part, Peters said that the firm will wait to see how the FT1 deal plays out before making further broadcasting deals.
While some linear channels already use services like YouTube TV to attract cord-cutters, offering their channels through Netflix or other streaming services could give them more leverage in deals with companies like YouTube, help them generate more ad revenue, and grow and diversify their viewership.
Deals with streaming services could be a natural progression for linear channels being split off from legacy media firms' streaming businesses and whose programming faces an uncertain future. Speaking to FT, Peters noted that some people in France already think of “TV as Netflix.” And Belmer noted that linear TV is in “secular decline."
“We have tried to compensate for that decline, or limit it, by launching our own free-to-view streaming platform... but also [by] trying to tie up and benefit from the huge driving force of Netflix,” Belmer added.
Earlier this week, Nielsen reported that streaming recently overtook broadcast and cable viewing combined for the first time since Nielsen began tracking this data in May 2021. Streaming represented 44.8 percent of TV viewership in May, Nielsen said, compared to 20.1 percent for broadcast and 24.1 percent for cable. With broadcast and cable viewership steadily sinking, streaming service partnerships could serve as an unlikely life preserver for traditional media.
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