Roku Acquires Rights to Quibi Content for Less Than $100 Million

Roku has reached an agreement to acquire the rights to content from the now-defunct video streaming service Quibi (via The Wall Street Journal).

quibi

Roku reportedly paid less than $100 million to acquire the rights to Quibi's library of original content until 2022.

Quibi was a short-form video subscription service launched in April of last year. Executives believed that the service would be able to garner approximately 7.4 million subscribers during its first year, but it massively fell short with an estimated 400,000 to 500,000 subscribers. After courting a number of tech companies, including Apple, to see if it could be sold off, the service announced that it was shutting down in October 2020.

Roku is the biggest streaming media player in the United States, with a library of more than 40,000 movies and TV shows, and the acquisition of Quibi's content will offer a boost of more than 75 shows and documentaries.

Quibi's content will also be among the minority of exclusives on the platform, as the majority of Roku's programming is also viewable elsewhere. The acquisition is expected to give Roku more leverage in negotiations with advertisers, who may pay more to show their ads alongside shows that viewers are unable to see elsewhere.

Tags: Quibi, Roku

Popular Stories

Verizon New

Verizon is Down: iPhones Show 'SOS' Mode Due to Network Outage [Resolved]

Wednesday January 14, 2026 10:18 am PST by
Verizon is experiencing a major outage across the U.S. today, with hundreds of thousands of customers reporting issues with the network on the website Downdetector. There are also complaints across Reddit and other social media platforms. iPhone users and others with Verizon service are generally unable to make phone calls, send text messages, or use data over 5G or LTE due to the outage....
iPhone Top Left Hole Punch Face ID Feature Purple

New Leak Reveals iPhone 18 Pro Display Sizes, Under-Screen Face ID, and More

Wednesday January 14, 2026 7:09 am PST by
While the iPhone 18 Pro models are still around eight months away, a leaker has shared some alleged details about the devices. In a post on Chinese social media platform Weibo this week, the account Digital Chat Station said the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max will have the same 6.3-inch and 6.9-inch display sizes as the iPhone 17 Pro and iPhone 17 Pro Max. Consistent with previous...
iPhone Top Left Hole Punch Face ID Feature Purple

iPhone 18 Pro Launching Later This Year With These 12 New Features

Thursday January 15, 2026 10:56 am PST by
While the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max are not expected to launch for another eight months, there are already plenty of rumors about the devices. Below, we have recapped 12 features rumored for the iPhone 18 Pro models, as of January 2026: The same overall design is expected, with 6.3-inch and 6.9-inch display sizes, and a "plateau" housing three rear cameras Under-screen Face ID...
2024 iPhone Boxes Feature

Apple Adjusts Trade-In Values for iPhones, Macs, and More

Thursday January 15, 2026 11:19 am PST by
Apple today updated its trade-in values for select iPhone, iPad, Mac, and Apple Watch models. Trade-ins can be completed on Apple's website, or at an Apple Store. The charts below provide an overview of Apple's current and previous trade-in values in the United States, according to the company's website. Most of the values declined slightly, but some of the Mac values increased. iPhone ...
maxresdefault

Google Gemini-Powered Siri Will Reportedly Have These 7 New Features

Tuesday January 13, 2026 7:52 pm PST by
Apple and Google this week announced that Gemini will help power a more personalized Siri, and The Information has provided more details. Subscribe to the MacRumors YouTube channel for more videos. As soon as this spring, the report said the revamped version of Siri will be able to… Answer more factual/world knowledge questions in a conversational manner Tell more stories Provide...

Top Rated Comments

tsa1 Avatar
66 months ago
They over paid lol
Score: 8 Votes (Like | Disagree)
doboy Avatar
66 months ago
Flushing money down the drain.
Score: 6 Votes (Like | Disagree)
calstanford Avatar
66 months ago
What an incredible waste of money. No one watched the stuff before, no one will watch the same old stuff now
Score: 5 Votes (Like | Disagree)
scottct1 Avatar
66 months ago
I didn't watch their content when I had a free account from T Mobile, why do they think I am going to watch now?
Score: 3 Votes (Like | Disagree)
sw1tcher Avatar
66 months ago

Mindshare is different than market share, though. If I hear about a new hit streaming show, it’s on Disney+, Hulu, Netflix, Peacock, or AppleTV+. I’ve never once heard someone talk about some new show they’re getting into where they say, “Oh, it’s on The Roku Channel”. (Actually, this is the first I’m hearing of The Roku Channel.) While there do seem to be viewers for Roku’s service, they don’t seem to have the same name recognition for original content as the major streaming services.
The reason you've never heard anyone talk about a new show on the Roku Channel and "they don’t seem to have the same name recognition for original content as the major streaming services" is because Roku never had their own original content until now.
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)
sw1tcher Avatar
66 months ago

I kind of fell that Roku paid too much for these shows. Few wanted them when they were on Quibi - why would people want them now that they're elsewhere?

What an incredible waste of money. No one watched the stuff before, no one will watch the same old stuff now

Sounds like alot of money for content that nobody was really interested in.
You have to ask why Quibi failed though.

Was it the content or was it:

- The timing of the launch (April 2020)? That was around the height of the 1st wave of the coronavirus pandemic.

- The name of the service? What's a Quibi?

- The business model? You pay $5 per month to watch a few short videos and you still get served ads? Yes, their business model is similar to Hulu's ad supported version of which 70 percent of their subscribers are on ('https://variety.com/2019/digital/news/hulu-ad-supported-subscribers-70-percent-1203227954/'), but Hulu's got a lot more content (new, old, and originals) and they had 1st mover advantage. And if you took advantage of the Hulu Black Friday promos in 2018 ($$0.99/mo for 1 year), 2019 ($1.99/mo for 1 year), and 2020 ($1.99/mo for 1 year), Quibi is a poor value in comparison.

- Quibi had to acquire new subscribers from scratch and you had to watch the shorts on a small screen vs your big screen TV at home.

I don't believe the problem was the content; Quibi has several good shows ('https://editorial.rottentomatoes.com/guide/best-quibi-shows/').

Quibi managed to acquire "an estimated 400,000 to 500,000 subscribers."

Meanwhile, as of Q3 2020, Roku had 46 million active accounts ('https://ir.roku.com/static-files/2148e434-58e4-48e1-bd1c-926862e3c21b') and their Roku Channel reached 54 million U.S. households.

Roku's going to have a lot more people watching this content now. For Roku, this is an investment in their platform which, for their most recent quarter, grew revenue 78 percent year-over-year.
Score: 2 Votes (Like | Disagree)