If you can believe it, a month has passed since the Jimmy Kimmel Live! suspension saga was the latest unprecedented twist in the late-night talk show space. Kimmel was ousted from his long-running ABC show after a reference to Charlie Kirk's death was negatively received by the FCC and others, but the host was quickly reinstated less than a week after the suspension.
But we're still learning just how much Kimmel's suspension was rejected by a large group of people. Kimmel had vocal supporters in his corner, like Governor of California Gavin Newsom, but as it turns out, the thousands of fans and others dissenters who were speaking out on his behalf on social media actually put their money where their mouth was to fight back against Disney.
As new data released by research firm Antenna reveals, Disney+ and Hulu subscription cancellations doubled in the month of September 2025, the month of Kimmel's suspension. In August, Disney+ and Hulu had cancellation rates of 4% and 5%, but those numbers actually doubled to 8% and 10% in September. The Hollywood Reporter notes that these rates are usually consistent, but this marked increased was a clear response to ABC dropping Kimmel, if only for a week.
Obviously, it's also worth noting that not every cancellation can be explained as a reaction to Jimmy Kimmel Live! going off the air. Subscribers are always coming and going based on how much they're watching, what's being offered on streaming services, and price increases that de-incentivize subscriptions. Still, the numbers are too much of a coincidence to not mean something.
Variety also notes that Disney+ and Hulu's sign-up rates for new subscriptions also increased in September compared to July and August, though the figure did not double like with cancellations. Antenna's data isn't a one-for-one match with Disney's own data, which means that it's unclear how many of the cancellations were simply subscribers changing their existing plan to another.
Again, cancellations doubling in the same month that the late-night space had its most heavily debated change since CBS announced the cancellation of The Late Show with Stephen Colbert has to mean something, at least in part, about the public's support of Jimmy Kimmel. Of course, a lot of people agreed with the decision, but as the Disney+ and Hulu cancellation rates prove, a lot of people also took Kimmel's side. Enough to pull the plug on Disney-owned streamers.
Since the suspension was reversed, it's been mostly quiet on the late-night front, though this new data could certainly ruffle some feathers to those who hoped Kimmel wouldn't be reinstated on ABC. There's no doubt it's still precarious given what's happened so far this year, though we have already seen how fans will respond should another suspension or cancellation happen again.