2025: The Year of Max? UPDATED

The same week The Penguin rolled out globally as one of the most-watched premieres on Max, Kiwis have still to learn when or if they will be able to stream the service here, despite its imminent launch in Australia and Southeast Asia.

Today The Hollywood Reporter reported Max would debut here and across the Tasman early next year but this has since been corrected by parent company Warner Bros. Discovery.

“We look at all markets individually, and the New Zealand and Australia media landscapes are quite distinct,” a WBD spokesperson told ScreenScribe.

“New Zealand remains an attractive market for us with regards to Max but we have nothing to announce at this time.”

Max will launch in Australia in the first half of 2025, following its debut in Southeast Asia, Hong Kong and Taiwan later this year as the successor to these markets’ HBO Go services.

This week Max launched in Japan, within an existing streaming platform called U-Next.

Should Max eventually land here, it’s not clear if WBD would opt for a stand-alone direct-to-consumer model or operate within a partnership with Sky (which hitherto has exclusive access to HBO content) or its parent company, which owns Three and ThreeNow.

Per The Hollywood Reporter quoting WBD’s Asia Pacific president James Gibbons:

Despite launching in the U.S. in May 2020, Max, previously HBO Max, has had a slow global direct-to-consumer rollout due to local market licensing and partnerships for HBO content, particularly in Asia and Australia. Gibbons added that WBD has adopted a “flexible and diverse” strategy with its launch plans for Max. “Our goal is to reach the fan base and find a route to market for the fan base,” Gibbons said, saying where it makes sense to work with a local partner, as is the case with Japan, the company will continue to do so.

When WBD and Sky announced the 2023 renewal of their multi-year content and platform deal, WBD was said to be keeping its options open on how and when to launch Max here.

That deal covered not only current and future seasons of HBO series on Sky but also Warner Bros. movies and WBD’s eight-channel portfolio (Discovery, Discovery Turbo, Living Channel, TLC, ID, Animal Planet, Cartoon Network, CNN International).