Fubo has rapidly positioned itself as a sports-first streaming powerhouse, but to overtake YouTube TV, DIRECTV, Sling TV and claim the top spot in the U.S. market, the company faces four critical challenges. Industry observers and longtime cord-cutting analysts believe that successfully addressing these areas could dramatically accelerate subscriber growth and cement Fubo as the dominant player in virtual pay-TV.
Important: Please note this is an editorial from our owner, Luke Bouma, where he gives his opinions on the current state of streaming services and how they can become better. This is the first in a series of stories on how he thinks streaming could be better for the end users.
1. Expand Multiview to All Roku Devices – The Fastest Way to Win Millions of Living Rooms
Roku remains the undisputed leader in both streaming players and smart-TV operating systems in the United States. Despite this massive installed base, Fubo’s signature Multiview feature – which allows viewers to watch up to four games simultaneously on one screen – works on only a limited selection of Roku hardware. Most popular models, including the new high-end Roku Pro Series televisions and the majority of Roku streaming sticks and boxes, still lack support.
This gap creates a painful customer experience. New users frequently discover the limitation during free trials, realize they cannot use one of Fubo’s most celebrated features on their primary television, and quickly switch to competitors that offer comparable functionality across the entire Roku ecosystem. Earlier Fubo tested back in 2023 a workable Multiview solution similar to YouTube TV’s implementation, but the project was paused. Restarting and completing that initiative would instantly make the feature available to tens of millions of additional households and remove one of the most common reasons for trial abandonment.
2. Add Multiview to Hulu + Live TV – Turning a Strong Contender into a Category Killer
Now that Fubo manages Hulu + Live TV multiview needs to be its main focus. The service already boasts well over four million subscribers and strong brand recognition, yet it continues to lack any form of multiview capability. Our readers tell us multiview is among the top-requested features from live TV streaming customers.
Deploying Fubo’s battle-tested Multiview technology to Hulu + Live TV would create an immediate competitive advantage. The combination of Hulu’s vast on-demand library, Disney-owned entertainment channels, and a robust multiview experience for subscribers would appeal to a broader audience than either service currently reaches alone.
3. Restore NBCUniversal and Warner Bros. Discovery Channels Without Destroying Pricing
The ongoing absence of key networks from NBCUniversal and Warner Bros. Discovery represents the single largest content hole in Fubo’s lineup. Viewers miss TNT, TBS, USA Network, NBC broadcast affiliates, the upcoming NBC Sports national feed, CNN, and the newly rebranded MSNow (formerly MSNBC). These gaps affect both sports and news consumption – the two primary drivers of live TV streaming subscriptions.
Sports fans lose access to many sports networks like NBC, TNT, TBS, USA Network, and more with critical college basketball tournaments, and a growing slate of national events moving to the new NBC Sports network. News viewers also do not have access to MSNBC now called MS Now or CNN meaning subscribers who prefer non-Fox News perspectives and wanted MS Now or CNN are out of luck. News is still the number two reason people watch live TV and missing two of the largest news networks is a major issue Despite surpassing one million subscribers, Fubo has not yet secured carriage rates from these major networks that align with its goal of remaining price-competitive against larger rivals.
4. Leverage Combined Scale for Better Carriage Deals – The Ultimate Growth Lever
The recent business combination gives Fubo and Hulu + Live TV together a subscriber footprint that finally approaches the scale needed to negotiate from strength. Industry experts believe the merged entity now possesses enough leverage to return the missing networks at sustainable rates while maintaining or even reducing monthly pricing for consumers. Successfully threading this needle would eliminate the most frequently cited reasons for choosing rival services because of a higher price point that Fubo has had to pay for its channels.
After more than a decade of tracking the cord-cutting space, Fubo already delivers one of the strongest sports-focused experiences available but it has only brought in about 1+ million subscribers vs the reported 10 million YouTube TV has. Executing on these four priorities – full Roku Multiview support, Hulu + Live TV Multiview, affordable return of major missing networks, and smart use of combined negotiating power – could transform the company from a strong niche player into the undisputed leader in American streaming television. The technical foundation, subscriber base, and operational control now exist; the remaining question is speed of execution.
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