As its pending $22 billion merger with Fox Corp. inches continues to wind its way through the regulatory process, Roku delivered strong third-quarter results Monday.
Total revenue in the July-to-September period surged 24% from the prior-year period to hit $1.5 billion, with earnings per share zooming to $1.20 from 16 cents in the same frame of 2025. Both metrics were substantially better than Wall Street analysts’ consensus forecast.
When Fox reported its results earlier in the day, CEO Lachlan Murdoch said the merger has cleared all major regulatory hurdles outside the U.S. and also has received shareholder approval. The Department of Justice’s antitrust division is currently reviewing the transaction, which is expected to close in the first half of 2027.
“[We] expect to close the transaction as soon as we can,” Murdoch said on the Fox earnings call, adding that the company’s “conviction in the opportunity has only grown.”
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Streaming hours on Roku TVs and connected devices climbed 9% to 39.9 billion, while advertising, subscription and platform revenue all jumped more than 20%. Ad revenue increased 23% to $727.4 million.
“Similar to Q2, political advertising on the Roku platform in Q3 exceeded the comparable quarter from the 2024 U.S. presidential election cycle,” the company wrote in its shareholder letter. “The Media & Entertainment vertical also continued to strengthen, and Q3 was the highest YoY revenue growth in four years as media companies invested on the Roku platform to promote their content and services.”
About 80% of all ads during the quarter were sold via programmatic systems, which involve an automated process rather than traditional campaign planning, the letter also noted.
While devices generate only a minority share of total revenue (up 33% in the quarter to $194 million), the makeup of the segment has shifted a bit. Three years into its effort to make its own TV sets as opposed to purely licensing its user interface to third parties, Roku said its own TVs now account for nearly 8% of all U.S. TV sales by volume.
Vizio, a smart-TV maker and longtime Roku rival, is now owned by Walmart and has sought to leverage its advantage at retail with its streaming advertisers.
