MultiChoice revenue is still shrinking a year into Canal+ ownership, but the fall is slowing. In a trading update on Thursday, 22 October, the French group said revenue at the South African pay-TV business that runs DStv and GOtv fell 3% on a like-for-like basis in the nine months to September. In the third quarter alone, the decline eased to 2%, from 3.4% in the first half of the year.
Canal+ chief executive Maxime Saada said the company is "making good progress with the MultiChoice turnaround plan". The numbers support a slower decline. They do not yet show growth.
MultiChoice revenue in the numbers
The figures below come from the Canal+ trading update as reported by TechCentral's Duncan McLeod and ITWeb's Admire Moyo.
- MultiChoice, nine months: down 3% like-for-like, driven by lower subscription revenue in South Africa.
- Reported MultiChoice revenue: up 0.4% to €1.81 billion, helped by what Canal+ called "a material positive currency effect".
- Canal+ group revenue: €6.412 billion, up 37.5% from €4.664 billion, mostly because MultiChoice is now consolidated. Like-for-like, group revenue fell 0.3%.
- Canal+ without MultiChoice: €4.646 billion, up 1.3%.
- Africa and Asia segment: €2.604 billion, more than three times last year's level after the acquisition. Like-for-like growth was 0.7%. Without MultiChoice, the segment grew 10.2%.
That last pair of numbers tells the story. Canal+'s existing African business, built largely in French-speaking markets, grew at double digits. Adding the South African group dragged the combined segment close to flat.
Subscribers: no number this time
Canal+ did not disclose subscriber totals. It said the Africa and Asia base "normalised" in the third quarter after "a significant boost from the FIFA World Cup" in the first half of 2026. In other words, people who signed up for the tournament did not all stay.
South Africa is the problem, the rest of Africa is not
The weakness is concentrated in South Africa. TechCentral reported that revenue rose in most of MultiChoice's other English-speaking markets, which partly offset the decline at home. South African households have been cutting or downgrading pay-TV subscriptions for several years as streaming services, cheaper data and tighter budgets change how people watch.
Canal+'s answer so far is to give subscribers more for the same money rather than cutting prices. On 17 September it relaunched the South African packages, replacing the Access, Family and Compact bouquets with new tiers called Starter, Select and Sports, and adding a Movies & Series option. Saada described the approach as "providing subscribers with more content, greater choice and better value for the same price". Canal+ said the new offers will roll out across English- and Portuguese-speaking Africa "over the coming months".
What happened to Showmax
Canal+ shut the Showmax streaming service at the end of April. Its revenue was small next to the satellite business, at €33 million for the first nine months of 2025 and €10 million in the third quarter of that year, according to TechCentral. Closing it removed a costly bet on competing head-on with global streamers.
What Canal+ is betting on next
Sport remains the main lever. Canal+ has secured UEFA club competition rights in more than 40 African countries from 2027 to 2031, which gives it a premium product to sell across the continent for the rest of the decade.
The company also kept its 2026 guidance, which ITWeb listed as:
- flat revenue for the year
- adjusted EBIT of €735 million
- operating cash flow above €600 million
- free cash flow above €250 million, before a VAT settlement and restructuring costs
- synergies of €250 million in adjusted EBIT and €220 million in free cash flow from the MultiChoice deal
"We remain well on track to achieve our 2026 synergies target and deliver our full-year guidance," Saada said.
Synergies usually mean cost cuts. That matters for African creatives and suppliers who depend on MultiChoice commissions, and for the thousands of installers and agents in its distribution network.
What this means for African tech and media
The MultiChoice results show how hard it is to defend a subscription business when customers have more choice and less money. Cheaper mobile data, local streaming apps and free platforms like YouTube compete for the same evening hours as DStv. Canal+ can lower costs and lean on football, but its South African revenue will only recover if households decide the bundles are worth paying for again.
Pricing pressure is showing up across digital services on the continent. Spotify's new audiobook plan in Nigeria is one recent example of a global company testing what African consumers will pay, as we reported in our look at Spotify audiobooks in Nigeria.
The next test for MultiChoice comes with Canal+'s full-year results. If the third-quarter decline of 2% narrows further after the September package relaunch, Saada will have a stronger case that the turnaround is working. If it widens again once World Cup sign-ups have fully washed out, the pressure to cut deeper will grow.
