Five distributors, and five different answers to the same question. Exactly one has published a document that says, in months, how long after a theatrical release a film reaches a streaming service. Two more have fixed an ordering without ever stating a length. The rest have published nothing of the kind.
That difference is the story. Reelio read the four output agreements in full, at the companies' own newsrooms rather than in coverage of them, and the exercise produces a distinction almost nothing written about streaming dates bothers to make: a contractual outside date and an estimate are different objects, and only one of them is knowable in advance.
What each studio has actually put in writing
| Distributor | Published document | What it specifies | First streaming home | Date computable? |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Universal / Focus / Illumination / DreamWorks Animation | Comcast, 6 July 2021 | Peacock no later than four months after theatrical | Peacock | Yes, as a ceiling |
| Sony Pictures Entertainment | Netflix, 8 April 2021 | Netflix first pay window, positioned after two prior windows | Netflix | No |
| Lionsgate | Comcast, 2 May 2022 | Peacock and NBCUniversal networks, Pay 2 window | Not addressed | No |
| Warner Bros. Discovery, Walt Disney | None | Nothing published | HBO Max, Disney+ | No |
Last verified: 1 August 2026.
Universal is the only one where you can do arithmetic
Comcast's release of 6 July 2021 commits Universal, Focus Features, Illumination and DreamWorks Animation titles to Peacock "no later than four months following their theatrical debuts". It also describes what happens to the rest of the traditional 18-month Pay-One window, splitting it into three segments: the first four months exclusive to Peacock, a 10-month middle period open to other distribution partners, and a closing four months back on Peacock exclusively. The arrangement took effect with the 2022 theatrical slate.
Apply that to a specific film. Universal's official site for The Odyssey (universalpictures.com/movies/the-odyssey 301-redirects to odysseymovie.com) gives a theatrical date of 17 July 2026, Christopher Nolan directing, Universal Pictures distributing, shot entirely with IMAX film cameras. Four months from 17 July 2026 lands on or about 17 November 2026.
Read that number as a ceiling and nothing else. The contract language is "no later than", which fixes an outside date and permits any arrival before it. Reelio is not predicting 17 November, and no Peacock arrival date for the film has been announced by anyone. What the document supports is a narrower and more useful claim: absent an amendment, the film is contractually due on Peacock by roughly that date, and a piece of coverage placing it in 2027 is asserting something the published agreement does not allow.
The Netflix deal that does not apply here
There is a live trap in the Universal material. NBCUniversal announced on 30 October 2024 that Netflix would take live-action Universal Pictures and Focus Features titles, with films arriving no later than eight months after theatrical and Netflix holding a 10-month exclusive after the Peacock premiere before the film returns to Peacock.
That arrangement begins with the 2027 slate. A 2026 Universal release is not covered by it. The most recent published document that governs a 2026 Universal title remains the 2021 one, and Reelio found no published amendment covering the 2026 slate. Anyone writing that Universal films now go to Netflix has read the 2024 release without reading the year attached to it.
Sony gives you an ordering, not a number
The Sony arrangement is the one most often described incorrectly, and the error is a single dropped clause. Netflix's announcement of 8 April 2021 states that Netflix "will obtain first pay window rights to SPE titles following their theatrical and home entertainment windows", beginning with Sony's 2022 slate.
Two windows, not one. The film clears theatrical, then clears home entertainment (the paid digital and physical purchase and rental window), and only then does the Netflix clock become relevant. Coverage that summarises this as Netflix getting Sony films after theatrical has removed the middle term, which is precisely the term that makes Sony gaps run longer than Universal gaps.
The other half of the point is what the release does not contain. It attaches no duration to either window. That is why the Sony document cannot generate a date the way Comcast's can, however carefully you read it. One agreement gives a number and one gives an ordering, and only a number survives contact with a calendar.
Sony's position has since widened. Netflix confirmed on 15 January 2026 that it currently holds Pay-1 rights to Sony feature films in select territories including the United States, Germany and across Southeast Asia, with a new global arrangement rolling out gradually from later in 2026 and full global availability in early 2029. Named upcoming titles include The Nightingale, Sony Pictures Animation's Buds, the live-action The Legend of Zelda, Spider-Man: Beyond the Spider-Verse and Sam Mendes' four Beatles films. The territory-by-territory rollout is worth holding on to, because it means a Sony film's streaming home is now a question with different answers in different countries.
The Lionsgate agreement is about the second window
Comcast's release of 2 May 2022 confirms a multiyear output agreement bringing Lionsgate theatrical films exclusively to Peacock and NBCUniversal networks for their Pay 2 window starting in 2024, beginning with the 2022 slate.
Pay 2 is the window after the first pay window, which is a different product from everything above. The release makes no mention of Starz and says nothing about where a Lionsgate film streams first. A reader who takes this document as an answer to "where does the new Lionsgate film premiere" has answered a question it was not written to address.
Warner Bros. and Disney publish nothing, and that is the honest answer
Warner Bros. Discovery has no output document for HBO Max because it owns HBO Max, and a company does not sign a licensing agreement with itself. Disney is in the same position with Disney+ and publishes no fixed theatrical-to-streaming window.
The temptation at this point is to time the gap on a couple of recent releases and present the result as a window. Reelio will not do that. Two data points with no published policy behind them is a sample, not a term, and dressing it up as one is how a number nobody committed to ends up circulating as though somebody did.
What is not known
No arrival date on Peacock for The Odyssey. None has been announced, and no Peacock listing for the title could be confirmed at source. The four-month figure is a contractual ceiling and nothing more.
Whether the 2021 Universal terms have been privately amended. Output agreements get renegotiated and the changes are not always announced. Everything above describes the published record.
Where Lionsgate's 2026 slate streams first. The company's Pay-1 position is unresolved in the public record without reading Starz Entertainment Corp's SEC filings, which Reelio identified but has not read. Trade reporting exists on this and trade reporting is not a primary document.
Sony's 2026 theatrical dates, at source. marvel.com returns HTTP 403 to automated requests and sonypictures.com blocks the fetcher entirely, so no Sony theatrical date is treated as primary-confirmed in this piece. That is why the Sony section above names only titles Netflix itself named.
Actual observed gaps for Warner Bros. and Disney titles. Not published here, because there is no published policy to compare them against.
The company newsrooms linked above are the source of record for this piece, and it changes when a published agreement does. The running record of what has moved sits in Explained, the summer titles still waiting on a date are tracked in this year’s list, and every change made to a published piece is logged in Corrections.
The practical consequence sits in the summer slate, where seven films still have no announced date despite their destinations being settled. If waiting is not the plan, the free ad-supported services already hold a deep back catalogue, which we go through in free legal streaming, and a library card covers the arthouse end.
