Prime Video Becomes the Emmys’ Exclusive Global Streaming Home, Ending 31 Years of Network Rotation
The Emmys are leaving broadcast television behind. The Television Academy and Prime Video announced on October 6 a six-year deal making Prime Video the exclusive global streaming home of the Emmy Awards starting with the 2027 ceremony, airing live every September. The show will stream free, with no subscription required, in more than 200 countries and territories, replacing the networks’ long-running hosting rotation that wrapped up with this year’s Widow’s Bay-sweeping ceremony.
What the New Deal Actually Covers
The agreement replaces the Television Academy’s traditional “Wheel Deal,” the rotation that had ABC, CBS, FOX, and NBC trading off broadcast duties since 1995, roughly 31 years before it concluded with this year’s telecast. Instead of a different network each September, Prime Video now holds the rights outright for six straight years, and the Television Academy is framing it as the first time the ceremony has had one dedicated worldwide home rather than a patchwork of regional broadcast deals. The ceremony itself isn’t changing format, it will still air live in September and anchor the start of the TV awards season, just without a paywall or a cable package required to watch it anywhere in the world.
The Emmy statuette is getting a new home: Prime Video, exclusively, for the next six ceremonies.
Why the Networks Let Go
The timing tracks with a broader ratings slide. NBC’s turn hosting this year’s ceremony drew 6.7 million viewers, down nearly 10 percent from the 7.42 million who tuned into last year’s broadcast on CBS, continuing a years-long pattern of the telecast losing ground on linear television even as streaming platforms keep growing their reach. The move also mirrors a trend already underway elsewhere in the awards world: the Oscars are set to make their own jump to YouTube starting in 2029, meaning the Emmys will have beaten the Academy Awards to a fully streaming-first future by two years.
What the Television Academy and Prime Video Are Saying
Television Academy chair Cris Abrego framed the move as a reach issue as much as anything else, saying “television has never been more global, and the Emmys should be a celebration” that audiences everywhere can watch live without paying for it. Mike Hopkins, head of Prime Video and Amazon MGM Studios, struck a similar note on the platform’s side, pitching free, worldwide access to the ceremony as part of Prime Video’s broader push into live entertainment and tying the deal to a promise to build out year-round Emmys content on the service rather than treating it as a single September broadcast.
No word yet on what happens to the traditional red carpet pre-shows or the Creative Arts Emmys that air the week before the main ceremony, but with the first Prime Video-exclusive Emmys still nearly a year away, there’s plenty of time for those details to shake out before the show that aired this past September becomes the last one anyone had to find a cable login to watch.
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Picture Source: Amazon, NASA/Bill Ingalls (CC BY 2.0)
