CNN’s New Subscription Streaming Service Craters After Launch, Big Cuts Coming: Reports

Big cuts are reportedly expected to be coming down the pipes for CNN’s new subscription streaming service, CNN+, after the service failed to garner even 10,000 daily users.

“Fewer than 10,000 people are using CNN+ on a daily basis two weeks into its existence,” CNBC reported. “To put that daily user number in perspective, CNN’s cable network suffered a sharp decline in viewership last year but still rang up an average of 773,000 total viewers a day.”

The report noted that there is widespread skepticism over whether there is enough demand to even sustain the service moving forward.

Axios reported that CNN’s investment in CNN+ is expected to be dramatically cut and that projections for how many subscribers that service was expected to get will also be significantly reduced.

“The news giant was initially planning to invest around $1 billion in the service over the next four years,” Axios reported. “CNN executives, with help from consulting firm McKinsey, originally expected to bring in around 2 million subscribers in the U.S. in the service’s first year and 15-18 million after four years.”