Disney content spending to reach $33 billion in 2022

Disney is a juggernaut. There’s no denying that. Especially after their acquisitions of Lucasfilm, Marvel Studios, and 20th Century Fox, Disney has grown to once unimaginable heights. This huge empire obviously pulls in a great deal of money, more than most of us can even imagine, but as the old saying goes, it costs money to make money. With the new year nearly upon us, The Walt Disney Company has released their annual report which includes just how much they’re planning on spending on content in 2022, and surprise, surprise, it’s a lot.

Disney plans on spending a whopping $33 billion on content over the next fiscal year, which includes their streaming programming, linear programming, and sports content. That’s definitely not small potatoes but it’s actually an $8 billion increase over their spending in 2021, where they spent around $25 billion on content. This increase is primarily driven by Disney’s various streaming platforms such as Disney+, Hulu, and ESPN+. With all the various Marvel and Star Wars projects Disney has planned, it’s easy to see where this money will go, but picking up sports rights is also pretty damn pricey. For comparison, Netflix, which is the biggest streaming game in town, spent close to $14 billion on content this past year; a huge amount to be sure, but less than half of what Disney is planning on spending.

The company also revealed that Disney Studios will release around 50 movies for theatrical and streaming distribution in 2022, with the studio’s General Entertainment division planning on producing around 60 unscripted series, 30 comedy series, 25 drama series, 15 docuseries/limited series, 10 animated series, and 5 made-for-TV movies. Disney did say that these releases could be impacted by possible COVID-19 delays, but Disney has been pretty strict when it comes to enforcing mandatory vaccinations and safety procedures on set. The latest big-budget Disney series, Hawkeye, recently debuted its first two episodes on Disney+. You can check out a review from our own Alex Maidy right here.