On Dec. 5, 2025, Netflix announced their plan to buy major entertainment studio, Warner Brothers, in a deal set at $82.7 billion. The agreement has not yet been finalized, but if approved, it would give Netflix control over franchises such as Harry Potter and the DC Universe. Warner Bros. currently owns the streaming service HBO Max; watchers can expect to see movies and television shows available on HBO Max to be slowly integrated into Netflix.
Netflix is not the only company interested in buying Warner Bros., Paramount has submitted a competing bid of $77.9 billion to also purchase the company. This has created a bidding process to decide which company will ultimately take control. According to Built-in, if Warner Bros. finalized the deal soon, it would increase competition and place more pressure on Paramount, as Netflix would control a much larger share of content.
San Marin High School sophomore Matthew Zelda thinks that the purchase could increase accessibility for more movies and television shows.
“Netflix will have more movies available to watch,” Zelda said. “If you could just buy a single subscription for Netflix, then you could get all those [new movies and] shows.”
Zelda also mentioned possible changes in subscription pricing.
“Netflix’s rate could go up due to the [bigger] selection of movies,” Zelda said. “I think Netflix is already expensive to stream right now.”
San Marin High School Advanced Placement Government, Microeconomics and Psychology teacher Michael Spinrad, who owns Warner Bros. stock, explained how the deal affected investor activity.
“It was originally priced around $20 a share and went down as low as seven [dollars]… then a few months ago, things started shooting up,” Spinrad said.
Spinrad stated that Paramount has offered a higher per-share price than Netflix, and believes that Paramount is attempting to persuade shareholders to support its proposal so it has the chance to be considered by Warner Bros. board of directors.
“Paramount also made an offer for $30 a share,” Spinrad said. “[They said] their offer is better, and the board of Warner Bros. says the Netflix offer is better… Enough shareholders may say yes that they can tell the board, ‘You need to take our offer seriously.’”
According to Forbes, the $82.7 billion offer places the potential deal among the largest deals in entertainment industry history. With Paramount and Netflix both pursuing the purchase of the studio, the outcome will depend on shareholder decisions and business approval.
