The YouTube studio known for short-form morality plays will produce original programming for kids, tweens, teens, and families. Disney announced the deal Friday and released no further details.
Disney has signed one of YouTube’s largest scripted studios.
The Walt Disney Company announced a content deal with Dhar Mann Studios on Friday, beginning with an initial 20-episode order.
The content will be made for kids, tweens, teens, and families. Additional details were not released.
What Dhar Mann Studios makes
The format is specific and enormously successful, and it is unlike anything currently on Disney’s platforms.
Dhar Mann Studios produces short-form scripted videos structured as morality plays, dramatizing a situation where someone behaves badly and then faces the consequence. Titles run in the vein of RICH GIRL Won’t Let Poor Girl To Her Sleepover and FOSTER MOM Makes Kids Fight For Love.
The Burbank-based company reports more than 170 million followers globally and nearly 300 million views per week across platforms. Its flagship YouTube channel has more than 27 million subscribers.
What Disney and Dhar Mann said
The statements came from senior leadership on both sides.
Asad Ayaz, Chief Marketing and Brand Officer at The Walt Disney Company, and Debra OConnell, Chairman of Disney Entertainment Television, said in a joint statement that Mann has built “a distinctive voice and an enormous global following.”
Mann framed it personally. “I grew up with Disney stories,” he said, adding that creating stories for Disney for the next generation is meaningful to him.
He also described what each side brings: his studio’s direct relationship with its audience, and Disney’s generations of characters that become part of people’s lives.
Where the Dhar Mann episodes will land
Disney did not say, and the format is an open question worth watching.
The Hollywood Reporter notes the deal arrives as Disney pushes to turn Disney+ into what the company calls a comprehensive membership ecosystem, which so far includes the Hulu integration and new content.
In March, Disney launched Verts, its short-form vertical video product on Disney+, and said at the time it would feature content from outside creators.
Whether these 20 episodes are vertical shorts, traditional episodes, or something else has not been announced.
Why Disney is buying creator content
The logic is about where young audiences already are.
Disney has been signing online creators for several years rather than waiting for them to arrive through traditional development. A studio with 27 million YouTube subscribers brings its own audience.
The trade-off is tonal. Dhar Mann’s videos are built around confrontation and comeuppance, which is a different register from most Disney family programming, and how much of that survives the move is the interesting question.
Twenty episodes is an initial order. What happens after depends on numbers neither company will publish.
Article compiled with the help of the Pirates & Princesses newsroom.
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Hat Tips:
Variety (August 21, 2026), Michael Schneider’s report including the joint statement from Asad Ayaz and Debra OConnell
Deadline (August 21, 2026), the initial 20-episode order and the target audience
The Hollywood Reporter (August 21, 2026), the Verts launch context and the Disney+ membership ecosystem framing
TheWrap (August 21, 2026), Mann’s full quotes and the subscriber figures
Laughing Place (August 21, 2026), the representative video titles