There's A Good Reason Why Fox Wants To Buy Roku For $22B

After buying Tubi for $440 million back in 2020, Fox Corporation is now in pursuit of another streaming brand for its portfolio: Roku. This time, the price tag is much higher. Announced on the morning of June 15, 2026, Fox says it plans to buy the streaming platform for $22 billion in cash and stock. If it goes through, it'd give Fox a much greater presence across connected television, digital advertising, and subscription distribution. It's a strategic move at a time when traditional media companies are struggling to keep up in the streaming economy.

The deal is expected to close during the first half of 2027. At that point, Fox's sports and news properties would exist alongside Tubi's free ad-supported streaming service and Roku's hardware business and streaming platform (including The Roku Channel). As it stands, Roku's platform reportedly already reaches more than 100 million streaming households worldwide. That user base generates massive annual engagement across its operating system, advertising network, and subscription ecosystem.

For Fox, the appeal is obvious: The company has been making a concerted effort to build its business around equal parts live sports, news programming, and advertising revenue. While it already has broadcast television on lock, taking ownership of Roku would give Fox more direct access to viewers across an entire brand of streaming devices, as well.

Looking back, it feels like Fox has been working toward this deal for a while now. It was nearly seven years ago that the company sold its entertainment division and IP to Disney. Since then, Fox has been focusing in on television networks, live events, and free ad-supported content. Then came the purchase of Tubi, and the launch of its own streaming service, Fox One.

With that in mind, the acquisition of Roku seems like the natural next step: It gives Fox one of the most widely used streaming platforms in the market, effectively giving the company a way to raise Tubi and Fox One's profiles rather than relying solely on other platforms to handle the content distribution.

That's likely why Fox doesn't seem interested in folding its streaming assets into a single service: Keeping Tubi and The Roku Channel separate lets the two platforms appeal to complementary audiences. Tubi can focus on on-demand viewing, while Roku Channel can focus on live channels alongside advertising and subscription revenue.