Channel 4 is coming to Disney+. From early 2027, Disney+ subscribers in the UK and Ireland will be able to watch Channel 4’s main live channel inside the Disney+ app, along with hundreds of hours of its shows, at no extra cost.
And it’s not only old box sets. Some brand new Channel 4 shows will land on Disney+ on the same day they come out on Channel 4, starting with Maya, a thriller led by Bella Ramsey, and Celebrity SAS: Who Dares Wins.
Disney+ did a smaller version of this with ITV last year. ITV is now on its way into Sky’s hands, though, and the BBC has spent most of this year trying to get Channel 4 into iPlayer instead. Disney+ got a signed deal first.
And if you’re asking yourself – wait, can’t I already watch Channel 4’s shows on… Channel 4’s own streaming service? The answer is yes, you can. So what’s the point? Discovery is the name of the game these days.
What’s Coming To Disney+
According to Channel 4 and Disney’s announcement, Channel 4 will get its own branded section inside Disney+, using the same menus and layout as the rest of the app.
The headline addition is Channel 4’s main channel, live, in HD, sitting inside Disney+ alongside Marvel, Pixar and everything else. You won’t need a separate app to watch it.
The announcement only mentions Channel 4 itself, so there’s no sign of E4, More4 or Film4 for now.
Next to it will be a catalogue of “hundreds of hours” of on-demand programmes, including Big Mood, Tip Toe and 24 Hours in A&E.
More interesting are what the companies call “day and date” releases: “multiple” new Channel 4 shows each year that appear on Disney+ at the same time they’re released on Channel 4.
Alongside Maya and Celebrity SAS, the first batch includes Stepping Up, a new comedy starring Denise Welch.
There’s no exact launch date yet. Both companies say timings and the full line-up will be confirmed “in due course”.
Of course, watching the live channel on Disney+ is still watching live TV, so you’ll need a valid TV Licence, just as you would on Freeview or in the Channel 4 app. A live channel is a live channel, whichever app it’s in.
Didn’t ITV Do This Too?
In a smaller way, yes. In July 2025, Disney+ and ITV struck a content-sharing deal that added a “Taste of ITVX” section to Disney+, and a “Taste of Disney+” collection to ITV’s free streaming service, ITVX.
Disney+ subscribers got a rotating selection of ITV hits like Mr Bates vs The Post Office, Endeavour and Love Island: All Stars. In return, ITVX viewers got the first series of Disney+ shows like Andor for free.
Channel 4’s deal is much bigger. ITV’s selection was a sampler of shows that had already aired. Channel 4 is putting its actual live channel on Disney+, plus new shows on the day they launch.
It also appears to be one-way: unlike the ITV deal, nothing has been said about Disney+ shows heading to Channel 4.
Then, in July this year, Sky agreed to buy the bulk of ITV, including ITVX, in a deal worth up to £1.6 billion. It still needs regulators’ approval and isn’t expected to complete until the second half of 2027, but ITV’s future is now tied to a company that already bundles Netflix, HBO Max and Disney+ into its own TV packages.
So while ITV heads into Sky’s orbit, Disney+ now has a British public service broadcaster of its own on board, and a deeper partnership than the one it had with ITV.
Why Would Anyone Need Channel 4 Twice?
On the surface, this sounds a bit silly. Channel 4 already has its own free streaming service, the Channel 4 app, available on most smart TVs and streaming devices. It even has a paid add-on, Channel 4+, which removes most of the adverts.
So why does anyone need another service, a paid one at that, to bring them the exact same shows?
As we said, it comes down to discovery. Channel 4 is betting that Disney+ has a different kind of audience: people who may never bother to install the Channel 4 app, but who open Disney+ every week.
Someone who loads it up to watch a Marvel film might scroll past Maya, give it a go, and discover a new Channel 4 show they’d never have found otherwise.
It’s the same logic ITV used last year, and Channel 4 has been following it for a while. It puts clips and full shows on YouTube, has had shows turn up on Sky’s NOW, and launched streaming-only channels on Freely.
Meanwhile, its own streaming service carries shows from UKTV’s U, like Red Dwarf. Channel 4 has spent years putting its shows wherever viewers already are, and Disney+ is the biggest of those places so far.
Then there’s the question of adverts. Channel 4 has confirmed to us that if you’re on one of Disney+’s ad-free plans, its on-demand shows will be ad-free too, just as ITV’s shows played without adverts when they came to Disney+.
In effect, an ad-free Disney+ subscription doubles as an ad-free way to watch Channel 4’s shows.
The live channel is a different story. Channel 4 says it will keep the same adverts as the regular broadcast, so you’ll still get the usual ad breaks there, whichever Disney+ plan you’re on.
What’s In It For Disney+?
Money, probably, in some form. Neither company has said how the deal works financially. The bigger prize, though, is turning Disney+ into a one-stop shop.
For years, the one-stop shop was the device. Buy a Fire TV Stick or a Roku, and every streaming service sits on one home screen. Now the services themselves want to be the one place you go.
Sky’s whole pitch is now bundling Netflix, Disney+, HBO Max and more into one subscription and one interface. Amazon’s Prime Video Channels let you add other services, even ITVX with live ITV channels, inside the Prime Video app. Disney+ itself has folded in Hulu and, since April, ESPN.
The same thing is happening abroad. In France, Netflix started carrying the live channels of French broadcaster TF1 in June. Disney says local broadcaster partnerships are “very important” as it builds its content libraries around the world.
For Disney+ in the UK, the pitch is simple: open the app and you get Disney’s own shows, plus local British TV from Channel 4, without loading up anything else.
The timing helps Disney, too. Just two weeks ago, Disney+ put up its prices on every plan, with Standard jumping 20% to £11.99 a month. A free live channel and same-day British dramas make that a little easier to swallow, perhaps.
So What About The BBC’s iPlayer Plan?
In March, the BBC proposed opening up iPlayer to ITV, Channel 4 and 5, creating one big British streaming home that could stand up to the American giants.
Then Sky agreed to buy ITV. Days later, the BBC’s director general, Matt Brittin, told MPs the BBC had held talks with Channel 4 about putting its shows on iPlayer, and described Channel 4 as “subscale” next to a combined Sky and ITV.
Channel 4’s chief executive, Priya Dogra, didn’t close the door. Speaking at the Royal Television Society’s London Convention in September, she said she was open to putting Channel 4 shows on iPlayer.
Asked whether Channel 4 was serious about it, she replied: “I don’t see why not.” She also argued that a British-owned platform for public service TV is important, while ruling out a merger, which she said “will be a takeover by the BBC.”
A month later, Channel 4 has signed up to put its live channel and new shows inside an American streaming service.
Does that kill the iPlayer idea? Technically, no. Channel 4 told us the Disney+ agreement “has been structured to preserve our flexibility”, and that it “does not prevent us pursuing other strategic partnerships where they make sense”.
But realistically, how many different places do we need to find the same Channel 4 content? Its own app, YouTube, Freely, Disney+, and maybe iPlayer one day too.
At some point, viewers could be forgiven for wondering which app they’re actually meant to use.
The Battle For Your Remote
In the end, all these services are battling for the same push of a button on your remote. They all want to be the app you load up first, because that’s where you’re most likely to find something to watch.
For Sky, that’s Sky. For the BBC, it’s iPlayer. Disney wants it to be Disney+, and putting a British broadcaster’s live channel inside its app makes that a much easier sell.
For Channel 4, the bet is that it doesn’t matter which button you press, as long as its shows are waiting behind it.
We’ll find out exactly how it all works, including the launch date, in early 2027.
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