Mumbai: The Walt Disney Company plans to phase out Hotstar operations in the US by late 2022, according to a report by Deadline.

All sports-related programming on Hotstar including the Indian Premier League will be streamed on ESPN+ going forward. ESPN+ will acquire all the cricket rights owned by Hotstar to stream in the US. IPL 2021 that resumes on 19 September will be available to US audiences via ESPN+. Other live cricket events including ICC Men’s T20 World Cup will also stream on the service.

All entertainment-related programming including Hotstar specials and Bollywood films will move to Hulu on a rolling basis. Currently, Hotstar specials like the Indian adaptation of “The Office”, “Hostages”, “Out of Love”. “City of Dreams”, “Live Telecast” and “Ok Computer” and films such as "Dil Bechara" and "The Fault in Our Stars" are available on Hulu.

Subscribers of Hotstar US who are not subscribers of any other Disney streaming service are eligible to get the Disney bundle including Disney+, Hulu and ESPN+ till the end of their Hotstar annual subscription, at no additional charge.  

The programming migration began on 1 September.