Overview

• On The Town podcast, Apple Services chief Eddy Cue rejected analyst estimates of roughly 45 million subscribers, saying the real total is significantly higher without providing a number.
• Apple has never published firm subscriber or viewership figures for its streaming service.
• The standalone plan costs $12.99 per month, up from $4.99 at launch in 2019, with many customers accessing the service through Apple One bundles or partner promotions.
• Cue cited the challenges of building without a legacy library and pointed to prolonged production slowdowns, including a year-and-a-half out of production and a nine-month strike.
• Profitability remains unclear as Apple is believed to spend several billion dollars annually on original programming, and any total approaching 100 million would place the service in a second tier well below Netflix’s 300 million-plus.