If you’ve revisited Moana in recent weeks, you’ve no doubt been refreshing your memory ahead of the anticipated sequel. I recently did the same thing ahead of my recent Moana 2 review, but an interesting statistic has been released that confirms the original movie is the most-streamed movie of the past five years, according to Nielsen data as seen by The Wall Street Journal, not just on Disney Plus alone.
With plenty of titles to enjoy across the best streaming services, it might surprise you to learn that Moana is the one we can’t get enough of. Not that there’s anything wrong with the movie, of course. It’s a feel-good movie that encourages you to sing along and is worthy of a spot on our best Disney Plus movies list, but even when you look at Disney’s huge back catalog, there are other award-winning titles you might assume would take the crown instead.
Here’s what you need to know about the surprising Moana news.
How did Moana become the most-streamed movie?
When you look at the numbers, Moana has been watched a lot. According to The Wall Street Journal, which reporters viewership figures by Nielsen, it has been viewed “for a total of more than 1 billion hours which amounts to one person sitting through the movie 775 million times. Or watching Moana for 150,000 years straight”.
The publication compared that to other Disney hits like Encanto, which has had 37.1 billion minutes streamed, and Frozen 2, which has been watched for 30.7 billion minutes. The original Moana comes in higher at 44.8 billion. The animated movie was both the number one movie in all of streaming last year and the number one movie over the past five years combined, so its impact has been huge.
As for the above question, it seems to have come as a surprise to everyone! Jared Bush, the chief creative officer of Walt Disney Animation Studios told WSJ: “A movie that came out that many years before suddenly popping – I mean, obviously it’s unprecedented.”
The biggest reason for its success comes down to it being a family-friendly movie. When children like something, they watch it a lot. I can attest to this as I broke my Mary Poppins VHS when I was a child because I’d watch it obsessively, apparently, so the fact movies like Moana are so readily available makes it easier for children to watch them over and over. And there are no VHS tapes to break nowadays, so you really can watch it as much as you like!
Whatever the reason, it’s a huge win for Disney Plus, especially given the recent buzz around Moana 2. Despite its lower rating than the first installment, it’s still certified fresh on the Tomatometer and definitely worth your time.
