HBO Max has the most award-winning SVoD catalogue

Joe Hall from Ampere Analysis writes:

Based on over 35 international media awarding bodies, HBO Max offers the highest number of award-winning TV shows and movies of any US subscription video on demand (SVoD) service.

Not only does HBO Max sit in the top spot – offering just shy of 700 award-winning titles – it also has the highest concentration of championed content, with 21% of its titles being victorious. Netflix and Amazon, which follow HBO Max in the volume of award-winning content offered, have much lower proportions at 10% and 7% respectively. HBO Max also beats smaller, award-dense platforms such as Apple TV+ (19%).

HBO Max has called on a catalogue of older, critically-acclaimed content, with almost three quarters of its award-winning titles being over 10 years old. Of these older award-winning titles, 79% are movies, composed of Warner Bros.’ sizeable movie catalogue (137 titles) and content licensed through a partnership deal with The Criterion Channel (122 titles). Of the decorated TV Shows, HBO-produced titles make up the largest share (30%). 

More recent HBO content is also recognised by industry awards, with the 2022 Primetime Emmys seeing HBO and HBO Max jointly claim a leading 38 wins across 13 shows. This included the most-decorated show The White Lotus, which won in 10 out of the 13 categories it was nominated in, as well as shows with multiple wins including Euphoria (6) and Succession (4).

Netflix also saw a successful Emmys season, with 26 total wins across 11 shows including historic wins for South Korean drama Squid Game, which claimed six awards, the most ever by a non-English language series. Netflix’s much younger award-winning catalogue is driven by its original series, with 43% of all award-winning titles under 10 years old being a Netflix Original, and a further 25% being Netflix Exclusives.

A smaller but highly-decorated catalogue, with a focus on quality over quantity, has allowed HBO Max to compete with streaming incumbents such as Netflix and Amazon. Amid a shrinking pool of licensable content, and with overall budgets under review, Ampere expects leading SVoD platforms, including HBO Max, to continue investing in high-quality awards-friendly titles that consumers engage with long after the initial release.