South Park Will Be An HBO Max Streaming Exclusive Starting In 2020

WarnerMedia's HBO Max streaming service has nabbed the exclusive streaming rights to adult animation hit South Park, the company announced on Wednesday. The latest rights deal means all 23 past seasons of the series will be exclusively available to stream on HBO Max starting next summer.South Park, the crude animation that launched in 1997 from Trey Parker and Matt Stone, remains a popular hit for Comedy Central, the network on which it airs. The series is currently available to stream on Hulu, but that will change in June 2020 with the show's arrival on HBO Max, the upcoming video streaming service from AT&T's WarnerMedia.

The company scored the show's exclusive streaming rights in the United States — the series will arrive on the platform only a month after it finally goes live for the public. The new deal also covers the next three upcoming seasons of the series; HBO Max subscribers will get access to each new episode 24 hours after it first airs on Comedy Central.

South Park is the latest major series to land on HBO Max, which will also be home to a Boondocks reboot, classic mass hits like Friends and The Office, as well as content that targets younger viewers, including four newly announced Adventure Time specials.

The platform will join an increasingly crowded market, arriving months after the release of Apple TV+ on November 1 and the massive Disney Plus service on November 12. Unlike those two services, however, HBO Max will be somewhat expensive at $14.99/month, tipping over the cheaper options from competitors like Hulu, Amazon Prime, and Netflix.