Warner Bros. Discovery’s flagship streaming service, HBO Max, turned five last month. While Warner seems more concerned about the bigger anniversary this year (HBO itself turning 50), HBO Max reaching the half-decade mark is still worth noting. As such, I thought I’d look back at the rather tumultuous history of this streaming service.
HBO Max over the years
I’ve written previous reviews about HBO Max in 2020 (after its launch) and in 2021.
HBO Max launched as part of the “streaming wars” gold rush, when everyone was launching a streaming service. HBO Max was basically an update/consolidation of the older HBO Go/HBO Now “TV Everywhere” apps tied to HBO subscriptions.
HBO Max had some initial strengths. It served as a home for much of the Warner Bros. library (though Boomerang still existed), plus same-day theatrical film releases during the height of the pandemic in 2020. (Even if the latter put them at odds with Hollywood producers and directors who only wanted theatrical releases, COVID or not.) The mobile app also uniquely allowed you to customize your own profile avatar via an image upload.
Still, early on, HBO Max was also plagued with some glaring flaws, though most of these were fixed. By 2022, HBO Max was good enough that it could replace Netflix as a main “catch-all” streaming service.
Unfortunately, that optimism was short-lived, as 2022 also saw Warner Bros.’s merger with Discovery finalized. The newly christened Warner Bros. Discovery, in the name of penny-pinching cost-cutting as well as dealing with a mountain of debt, went about gutting or undermining much of HBO Max’s strong points. The most infamous was removing much of the animation catalog, including the classic Looney Tunes shorts. They also folded into HBO Max much of the Discovery catalog of reality shows. By 2023, Warner Bros. Discovery even changed the streaming service’s name to the generic “Max,” a move they decided to reverse in 2025.
The image displayed above, dating from HBO Max’s 2020 launch, highlights the catalog changes well. Out of the cartoons listed, only some are still available on HBO Max; others are also available on other streaming services. As of this writing, the listed cartoons’ current availability:
- Adventure Time: On HBO Max and Hulu.
- The Boondocks: On HBO Max.
- The Jetsons: On Hulu.
- The Lego Movie: On Netflix.
- Looney Tunes: The original shorts aren’t available on streaming.
- The Powerpuff Girls (1998): Not available on streaming. (The 2016 reboot, however, is on Hulu.)
- Rick and Morty: On HBO Max and Hulu.
- Scooby-Doo, Where Are You!: On HBO Max and Tubi.
- South Park: On HBO Max.
- Spirited Away: On HBO Max.
Out of 10 cartoons advertised at launch, only six are still available on HBO Max. Four of the cartoons are available on other services (five if you count the “Powerpuff Girls” 2016 reboot), while two aren’t available on streaming period. The two cartoons unavailable being the original Powerpuff Girls (a flagship Cartoon Network show in the 90s/2000s) and Looney Tunes. The absence of Looney Tunes, the one cartoon that should be on a Warner-owned streaming service no matter what, is in my opinion a major failure of HBO Max.
On a less negative note, HBO Max recently entered into a bundling deal with what should be their chief rival, Disney+. The Disney Bundle is now available in a Disney+/Hulu/HBO Max configuration; it currently costs $17 a month with ads and $30 a month without ads.
HBO Max’s current state and future
Currently, HBO Max and Discovery+ combined have 122 million subscribers, putting it slightly behind Disney+’s 126 million. (I couldn’t find statistics for just HBO Max by itself, as Warner Bros. Discovery also includes HBO cable channel subscriptions in that number.) Despite its flaws, HBO Max is still one of the most popular streaming services, coming in behind Netflix (301.6 million), Amazon Prime Video (205 million, including MGM+), and the aforementioned Disney+. The strength of HBO and its loyal viewing base helps, as does having the DC Comics library and some live streaming of sports (though Warner Bros. Discovery foolishly lost TNT’s NBA rights).
As for its future, I don’t see HBO Max going anywhere—again, if nothing else, for HBO and its fans. (There’s a reason Warner CEO David Zaslav relented and rebranded it “HBO Max.”) That said, Warner’s content purges and other changes have dropped HBO Max from the “Netflix-style catch-all” status it had a few years ago. Unless one gets HBO Max at a Black Friday-style discount, I’d only recommend it for the following reasons:
- HBO
- Turner Classic Movies
- TNT/TBS sports (baseball, hockey, March Madness)
- DC Comics (though some of that content is now elsewhere)
- Adult Swim
- Studio Ghibli
Otherwise, you’re better off going elsewhere. Discovery+ is cheaper than HBO Max, and carries all of the Discovery reality shows (“90 Day Fiance,” etc.). Much of the Warner animation library is available on cheaper and/or more popular services: Hulu (“Adventure Time,” “Steven Universe,” “Craig of the Creek”), Tubi (“The Flintstones,” “Scooby-Doo”), MeTV (“Looney Tunes”), Amazon Prime Video (“Batman: Caped Crusader”), etc. Not to mention DVDs and Blu-rays, of course; fortunately, Warner’s still dedicated to physical media releases.
In my case, HBO Max’s negative aspects did have one benefit: they’re what prompted me to start buying physical media again, as well as restart having a home media server. But as for HBO Max itself, I don’t see myself resubscribing anytime in the near future.
Photo by Marco Verch (Flickr / CC BY / cropped from original)
