Disney+ and Hulu Bring Video Podcasts Onscreen, Starting With the Jonas Brothers
Disney+ and Hulu have signed a deal with iHeartMedia to stream six video podcasts from the iHeartPodcasts catalogue, beginning with the Jonas Brothers' show Hey Jonas! on 14 August 2026.
The announcement, reported by Deadline on 10 August, covers six titles in total: Hey Jonas!, Thanks Dad with Ego Nwodim, Pod Meets World, Fake Doctors Real Friends with Zach and Donald, Desperately Devoted, and StraightioLab. Variety confirmed the arrangement as a licensing deal — meaning Disney is paying iHeartMedia for the right to stream the shows on its platforms, rather than producing them itself.
Hey Jonas! kicks the slate off. Its debut episode revisits Camp Rock, the 2008 Disney Channel film that helped launch the Jonas Brothers' careers. Further episodes were recorded live at D23 — Disney's fan convention — featuring Kevin, Joe, and Nick Jonas.
The remaining five shows will roll out on a staggered schedule. Desperately Devoted, a podcast where fans catch up on Desperate Housewives episode by episode, begins streaming with video for the first time on 2 November. Fake Doctors Real Friends, hosted by Scrubs stars Zach Braff and Donald Faison, arrives on Hulu later this year. Dates for Thanks Dad, Pod Meets World, and StraightioLab have not yet been announced.
Video podcasts — shows originally recorded as audio, but filmed so viewers can watch the hosts talk — have become a familiar format on YouTube and Spotify. Bringing them to Disney+ and Hulu is a different play: these are subscription streaming services that have traditionally built their shelves around scripted series, films, and documentaries. The move effectively treats filmed conversation as another genre worth programming alongside original dramas and films.
Disney already has a foothold. Existing video podcasts on the two platforms include Handsome, We're Here to Help, The Mess Around With Hanna and Lamorne, Prison Break with Sarah and Paul, and That Was Us. The iHeartMedia deal adds a batch of titles that already have audiences built through audio distribution — listeners who could now follow the shows into a video environment they pay for.
Lauren Tempest, Head of Content Planning & Partnerships for Disney's direct-to-consumer division, commented on the deal, as did iHeartMedia Chairman and CEO Bob Pittman, according to Deadline. The Hollywood Reporter and Yahoo Finance also carried the announcement on 10 August.
For listeners, the practical change is straightforward: six podcasts that were once audio-only or scattered across other platforms now sit inside a Disney+ or Hulu subscription. For the people behind those shows — hosts, producers, and the iHeart teams that built them — it is a new window, and a new way for their work to reach a screen.
