Parts of Comcast might be struggling, but the company still feels “well positioned” in advance of the TV upfronts in May, according to Chief Financial Officer Jason Armstrong.
Comcast has confidence in “a healthy Peacock subscriber base” and strong content across entertainment and news, Armstrong told investors during the company’s quarterly earnings report on Wednesday.
Peacock, NBCUniversal’s streaming service, ended the quarter with 41 million subscribers, up from 36 million at the end of 2024, in no small part because the ad-supported tier was added to Charter’s Spectrum TV Select bundle for free in March.
In addition to the bundled Charter subscriptions, Peacock also raised its subscription rates last year, which contributed to the improved monetization, said Comcast President Mike Cavanagh.
Moving forward, said Cavanagh, streaming will be one of the six major categories that Comcast plans to invest in for growth, along with wireless, residential broadband, business services, theme parks and content.
By the numbers
Comcast’s revenue for the quarter declined roughly 0.6% compared to this time last year, from $30 billion in 2024 to $29.9 billion in 2025. (So Comcast’s revenue is down by roughly one Kris Jenner.)
Net income, meanwhile, dropped at a much higher relative rate, down 12.5% to roughly $3.34 billion for the quarter.
Where media is concerned, domestic advertising revenue dropped slightly to $1.86 billion at a year-over-year rate of 6.8%, which Armstrong attributed to tough comparisons from last year’s Summer Olympic Games and presidential election.
In contrast, revenue for NBCUniversal’s Peacock actually increased 16% YOY to $1.2 billion and earned almost $400 million of growth in EBITDA – meaning “earnings before interest, taxes, depreciation, and amortization,” for the uninitiated.
Similarly, EBITDA for the media business grew a whopping 21.5% to over $1 billion, mostly due to lower operating expenses for sports programming at Peacock and TV networks.
Proud as a peacock
For those concerned about how economic uncertainty in the United States will affect advertising budgets, Comcast shared what is starting to become a familiar sentiment this quarter: so far, they haven’t seen any negative impact.
Still, “advertising is the category that has shown the most economic-related cyclicality in our business, historically,” said Armstrong.
Plus, the impact of tariffs and businesses closing their purse strings didn’t begin until Q2.
What will keep advertisers on board, said Cavanagh, is Comcast’s current and upcoming content offerings, including Peacock’s 80,000-hour entertainment library, the NBA’s return to NBC in Q4 and upcoming blockbusters like the “Wicked” sequel. (Part One was Peacock’s most watched and purchased movie.)
Compared to other streaming services, Peacock “started late,” Cavanagh said – but that also gave NBCU more time to plan its content for a streaming ad platform, rather than shift on the fly.
“Our history of operational execution success would tell you that while sometimes we may not move first,” CEO Brian Roberts said, “once we get in motion, we do it extremely well.”
