Roku surpassed Wall Street expectations for Q4 2025, reporting record quarterly revenue, adjusted EBITDA and net income on the back of continued growth in its connected TV platform business.
And as the streamer, which tallied 90 million streaming households as of 2025, reported strong financial results, executives responded to questions about generative AI and short-form content – where they expect the technology to bring down content costs and boost consumption of longer-form content, to the benefit of Roku.
Before getting more into comments around AI, some key financial results from Roku’s Q4 and full-year 2025 earnings report.
Roku platform revenue of $1.2 billion in Q4 was up 18% year-over-year with a gross margin of 52.8%, Q4 Adjusted EBITDA totaled $169 million and Roku reported net income of $80 million in the quarter – all of which represent records for the company.
And device revenue – while no longer a growth engine for the company, was up 3% yoy in Q4 to $171 million.
For the full-year platform revenue also grew 18% yoy to $4.15 billion, with 2025 Adjusted EBITDA of $421 million and free cash flow of $484 million.
Roku back in 2024 outlined improved home screen monetization, growing subscriptions and expanding demand capabilities for advertisers as focus areas to help accelerate platform revenue growth.
It delivered on the goal of achieving break-even Adjusted EBITDA a year earlier than targeted, which CEO Anthony Wood said allowed Roku to invest further in the platform monetization efforts. That involved expanding third-party advertising demand access in 2025 with deepened DSP and other ad-tech partnerships, as well as more scaled measurement and performance ad capabilities.
And the latest financial results show efforts are starting to pay off.
Roku attributed full-year platform revenue growth to continued strength in video advertising and distribution of third-party streaming services.
Alongside last year’s the acquisition of virtual MVPD Frndly TV, premium subscription services also helped to drive platform revenue growth in Q4, which marked Roku’s biggest three-month period ever for premium subscription net adds and benefited from the holiday promo season.
HBO Max was among subscriptions more recently offered by Roku and Wood said Roku expects to add more Tier 1 third-party subscription partners and roll out third-party streaming bundles this year.
Also helping to boost subscriptions in 2025 was Roku efforts to surface content and services more prominently within its platform, including shifting partners to be featured in Content Rows, Live TV, and Sports destinations in the interface. Given those changes, the Roku Experience now drives more than half of all subscription sign-ups from the platform, according a quarterly letter to shareholders.
The TVOS player also plans to expand its $3 per month ad-free Howdy SVOD beyond the Roku system and take the low-cost streaming service to additional platforms.
As of the end of 2025 Roku tallied 90 million streaming households and expects to surpass 100 million this year.
Roku expects AI to drive more long-form consumption
On the earnings call Thursday, Wood fielded Wall Street questions around generative AI and the impact to streaming and Roku, where an analyst cited the notion that advances in genAI for video creation will likely greatly increase the amount of content available and therefore shift consumer time spent to more short-form videos.
With continued consumer attention given to short-form and social or creator video, streamers alike have been making respective forays and experimenting with how to bring different types of content to their platforms.
In response to questions Thursday, Wood expressed excitement AI technology and confidence in its ability to “reduce the cost of content significantly over time” – but it’s something he thinks bodes well for long-form content too, and ultimately Roku.
Because with lower costs for content he expects increased consumption, which could translate to more revenue for Roku.
“As long-form content costs come down, that’s going to grow engagement on our platform and we monetize engagement. That’s basically our business model is monetizing engagement,” he explained. “So I view it as all very positive for our business.”
Analysts noted Netflix is among those recently signaling it will add short-form and user-generated content to its own platform to try and up engagement, where Wood suggested there’s a place for shorter-form content on Roku but that more traditional-style TV content is still the bread and butter.
Roku already offers some short-form content and the CEO noted continual experimentation with different types and where to place it in the UI, but short-form’s not likely to become a priority in terms of programming for the platform.
“Although we do have some shorter form video and I’m sure that will grow, our focus really is on long-form video. That’s what people generally look for when they turn on their TV,” he noted, reiterating the believer that as content costs come down people will consume more.
“We’ll see more engagement of the long-form video and that’s a big opportunity for us as a platform,” Wood continued.
Analysts also asked about advertiser investment – which is key to Roku’s business – in terms of Roku’s ability to balance upping engagement with the introduction of new types of content like short-form and user generated while also maintaining its caliber of high-quality brand advertisers and brand safety standards that align with what some consider more “premium” content.
The company expects to get into more short-form content but as it does, Roku President of Media Charlie Collier said will do so against specific groups of viewers that the company has a good understanding of and is trying to super serve.
Premium content will continue to be the majority of what it does “in the foreseeable future,” Collier assured, but believes Roku’s platform benefits from the ability to figure out what the view wants to watch and how.
Some places where short-form content could show up, beyond creator or user-generated content, are Roku’s Sports Zone. There, Collier said viewers can get short-form content in the form of sports clips, commentary and other information, in partnership with leagues.
“There’s all sorts of ways you can do it and Roku is really good a putting it in context,” Collier said of short-form video.
Sees AI a tailwind, not disruptor
Taking a step back to a broader view of AI technology, “I think AI is a significant opportunity for Roku,” Wood said, categorizing it as a tailwind rather than a disruptor for the business.
He outlined a few areas where AI is being put to use for Roku. That includes the viewer experience to help personalize and simplify content discovery, such as surfacing trending content that increases engagement, as well as AI-generated “why to watch” summaries on content detail pages. It’s also marked traction for AI-powered voice capabilities for search and discovery.
And Wood called AI as “if not more important” to Roku on the advertising side, where it’s helping the CTV platform tap into an estimated $600 billion SMB ad spend market, including through its self-serve Roku Ads Manager platform.
“That's an entire new segment in the ad business that was not accessible to TV platforms before but is now because of AI,” Wood said. “AI allows products like Ad Manager to exist and AI tools make it easier for advertisers to create high-quality video ads, and the easier it is to create video ads, the larger the number of advertisers that can advertise on a TV platform.”
Check out StreamTV Insider’s special report on the topic of CTV players courting the lucrative but largely untapped SMB advertiser market here.