Fubo criticized NBCUniversal for its stance during the collapsed contract negotiations, which resulted in a blackout of NBCUniversal channels a few days before Thanksgiving, when large numbers of viewers were eager for turkey and football. NBC is set to air the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade, the National Dog Show and Thursday night’s NFL game featuring the Cincinnati Bengals battling the Baltimore Ravens. The programs will also stream on Peacock.
The blackout, which also includes Bravo, CNBC and Spanish-language Telemundo, affects about 1.6 million of Fubo’s customers.
The dispute comes a month after NBCUniversal’s rival Walt Disney Co. acquired a controlling stake in Fubo and folded the smaller sports-focused offering into Disney’s Hulu+ Live TV. (Hulu+ subscribers still have access to NBCUniversal channels as they are covered by a separate distribution contract.)
(Eduardo Munoz Avarez/Associated Press)
In its Tuesday statement, Fubo alleged that NBCUniversal had refused to give Fubo the flexibility to offer only certain channels instead of its entire portfolio. Fubo is looking to control costs and has designed its product as a slimmed-down version of a heavier bundle – but with a heavier complement of sports networks.
Fubo also raised the issue of NBCUniversal negotiating on behalf of the cable channels, which NBCUniversal plans to shut down in January as part of its corporate divestment.
Legacy cable channels including MS Now (formerly MSNBC), Syfy, CNBC, USA Network and Golf Channel will form a new publicly traded company, Versant.
“Fubo has offered to distribute Versant channels for one year,” Fubo said in its statement, adding that it views most of those networks as “not worth the cost.”
Fubo said, “NBCU wants Fubo to sign a multi-year agreement – over time the Versant channels will be owned by a separate company.” “NBCU wants Fubo customers to subsidize these channels.”
NBCUniversal, owned by cable and broadband giant Comcast, countered that it had offered Fubo similar terms to those included in deals with other pay-TV distributors – but Fubo did not agree.
“Unfortunately, this is par for the course for Fubo,” NBCUniversal said. “They have dropped several networks in recent years at the expense of their customers, who are constantly losing content.”
The blackout occurred on November 21, a week after Disney settled a separate, high-profile dispute with Google’s YouTube TV. That dispute, which resulted in a two-week shutdown of Disney-owned channels including ESPN for approximately 10 million YouTube TV subscribers, was dependent on a fee increase sought by Disney.
The two companies also clashed over YouTube TV’s desire to offer the ESPN streaming app to its subscribers at no additional cost.
They reached an agreement, and YouTube landed authorization to provide some ESPN streaming content.
In September, YouTube TV avoided a similar blackout of NBC channels by striking a deal just hours before the deadline.
Disney acquired 70% of fubo TV in October 2025.
(Justin Sullivan/Getty Images)
Fubo pointed to NBCUniversal’s recent deals with YouTube TV and Amazon Prime Video, which allow those companies to offer NBC’s streaming app Peacock as part of their channel stores. Fubo alleged that NBC refused to grant Fubo the same rights.
“Fubo is committed to providing our customers a premium, competitively priced live TV streaming experience with the content they love,” Fubo said. “This includes a number of content options, including a sports-focused service that can be accessed directly from the fubo app. We hope NBCU will reconsider its stance, or we will be forced to move forward without them.”
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