Your Disney favorites, anywhereSource: Ara Wagoner / Android Central

What you need to know

  • During the Q2 earnings call, Disney announced that Japan will get Disney+ in June.
  • We also have a more concrete timeline for Eastern Europe, which now looks to be coming in September.
  • South America is still set to get Disney+ around the end of the calendar year.
  • Disney+ now has roughly 54.5 million subscribers today.

Disney's earnings call was a bit of a downer today — Disneyland Shanghai is re-opening, but there's no guidance on when the domestic parks or film/TV product can restart — but Disney+ is still doing quite well, and we now know what countries should be getting the service in the next six months: Disney+ will be coming to Japan in June, and it appears both the Eastern Europe and South American launches are still on track for later this year.

Disney+ also updated its subscriber numbers, a month after announcing on April 8 that they has surpassed 50 million subscribers. Disney+ is now at about 54.5 million subscribers. This is a return to a more normal rate after a steep rise in subscribers in March, going from 33.8 million March 28 to 50 million by April 8 to 54.5 by May 4. The majority of that sharp increase came from Disney+ going live in Western Europe on March 24 amid stay-at-home orders.

During that Western Europe launch, a launch in Nordics, Belgium, Luxembourg And Portugal is now slated for September. South America was originally slated for the first half of fiscal 2021, and it is slated for the end of the calendar year, so that would put that launch sometime in mid-November or early December.

This was also a good quarter for Hulu, as it continued to hang onto its spot as the biggest streaming Live TV service.

International movie magic

Disney+

Going global takes time, but we're off to a good start.

Disney brings all of its content under one roof for streaming after years of it being split on half a dozen services. It's not available everywhere yet, but we're over a dozen countries right now.

We may earn a commission for purchases using our links. Learn more.

Rural Americans know the truth of what cellular providers' maps show
Needs more exploration

Rural Americans know the truth of what cellular providers' maps show

For all of the hoopla from cellular carriers about how fast their networks are, I'm over here with many other rural Americans asking when we'll get any coverage at all. The maps from carriers say one thing, but for those of us in the rural areas — we know the truth.