Friends is leaving Netflix and moving to WarnerMedia’s streaming service

Kevin Reilly of WarnerMedia announced Friends will likely be leaving Netflix and moving to WarnerMedia’s new streaming service at TCA 2019.

We have more bad news to share with Friends fans. Friends is all but leaving Netflix and headed to WarnerMedia’s upcoming streaming service in the near future.

Todd VanDerWerff of Vox was on hand at TCA 2019 for Kevin Reilly’s panel/presentation for WarnerMedia’s upcoming streaming service. There, Reilly revealed that Friends will likely be moving over to their unnamed and un-launched streaming service in the future.

Don’t panic yet, Friends fans. This move isn’t happening until 2020. Netflix paid $100 million to keep the series through the end of 2019. After that, it’s probably going to leave Netflix.

We shared VanDerWerff’s tweets below, along with another tweet from Kelly Lawler USA Today on WarnerMedia’s plan to bring Friends to the streaming service.

On whether Friends will come to the Warner streaming service: "I think you can expect that the crown jewels of Warner will ultimately end up on the service." -Kevin Reilly #TCA19
— Kelly Lawler (@klawls) February 11, 2019

We don’t know absolutely, 100 percent for sure that it’s happening. Netflix has not commented, but it’s pretty clear when Reilly is talking about adding the “crown jewels” to the streaming service that Friends, literally Warner’s best show, would have to leave Netflix.

On top of that, if Warner is really starting their own streaming service, it would be so dumb to allow Netflix, their direct competitor for eyeballs, to keep one the biggest shows in the world.

Netflix would love to keep Friends, I’m sure of that, but if you’re an eternal optimist, there is some silver lining here. Netflix would then have plenty of cash to throw at other projects, and lately, Netflix has been making some great shows and movies. It might not be a bad thing if Netflix has more money to throw around.

We’ll be sure to keep you posted on the future of Friends on Netflix. It’s not looking good, though.

WarnerMedia has still not indicated if their streaming service will be available outside of the United States. If it’s not, there’s a good chance Netflix will keep the rights to Friends internationally, but these shoes have yet to drop.

Stay tuned for more information about the series and where you can stream it.