Sesame Street Coming to Netflix (But the Show Will Still Be Free)

The letter N officially stands for “Netflix.” The most beloved kids program around is about to make its way to the streaming giant, as Netflix has just announced a deal to host Sesame Street ahead of its 56th season later this year. With HBO Max not renewing the rights to Sesame Street moving forward, Netflix has stepped in as the show’s new streaming service home.

Sesame Street will release new episodes on Netflix beginning with Season 56, which doesn’t have a specific release date but has been confirmed to debut in 2025. Netflix will also be gaining more than 90 hours of previous Sesame Street episodes for young fans to stream. The best news of all is that the move to Netflix doesn’t mean the free access to Sesame Street is ending.

PBS has always made Sesame Street free to the public and will continue to do so with Season 56. New episodes of the series will still have day-and-date releases on traditional PBS stations and on the PBS KIDS digital platforms. Netflix is going to hold the worldwide exclusive rights to Sesame Street, while sharing the distribution rights in the United States with PBS. Additionally, Netflix will be able to develop Sesame Street video games.

There will be some changes to Sesame Street next season, though the show has been working towards a revamped formula in recent years. Starting with Season 56, episodes will center around an 11-minute story, and will feature the return of beloved segments like Elmo’s World and Cookie Monster’s Foodie Truck. The season will also see the introduction of new segments, centering around things like Cooke Monster’s new Cookie Cart, as well as Abby Cadabby’s Fairy Garden.

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Season 56 of Sesame Street will be released in three separate batches on Netflix, beginning later this year. For this new season, the Emmy-nominated Halcyon Person is taking over as the show’s head writer.

When Netflix and Sesame Street made the announcement about the new partnership on Monday morning, they did so with the help of one of Sesame Street‘s most beloved figures. A short video posted to the social media channels for the companies shows Cookie Monster interacting with the Netflix logo, which you can check out in the video below.

At this time, Netflix hasn’t stated which episodes from the Sesame Street catalogue are going to be included in the new streaming library. There could always be more episodes added later, after the initial rollout this year.