Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve with Ryan Seacrest 2027 will stream live on Disney+ alongside its established ABC broadcast, marking the first time the annual New Year’s Eve special has been offered as a Disney+ simulcast.
The programming move gives viewers two ways to follow the countdown: the traditional linear-TV feed on ABC and a live stream through Disney+. It also keeps the show’s familiar on-air framework intact. Ryan Seacrest is returning as host from Times Square in New York, with singer Rita Ora returning as co-host.
Julianne Hough and Rob Gronkowski are also due back for pre-taped Las Vegas segments, while comedian and creator Druski will join the production from Chicago. Performers and further lineup details have not yet been revealed.
What a simulcast means for viewers
A simulcast is a single program carried at the same time through more than one distribution channel. In this case, Disney+ is not being positioned as a separate, later replay of the special; it will carry the event live at the same time as ABC.
That distinction matters for a countdown broadcast. New Year’s Eve programming depends on viewers experiencing musical performances, regional celebrations and the midnight moment as they happen. A live simulcast lets a streaming audience follow that shared schedule rather than arriving after the fact through an on-demand version.
The Disney+ addition does not, on the information currently available, signal a redesigned format, a different host team, or a separate performer slate for streaming. It is an expanded viewing option for the same broadcast. Specific access details, regional availability, performance scheduling and the precise run time have not been announced.
A large recent edition sets the scale
The prior edition expanded to eight hours, the longest telecast in the program’s history of more than 50 years. Its presentation included 42 performers and four live countdown celebrations, with material connected to Times Square, Las Vegas, Chicago, Puerto Rico, Nashville, Kansas City and other locations.
That scope illustrates why a New Year’s Eve special is more complicated than a single-stage concert. The broadcast has to move between cities, balance performances with countdown coverage, and keep its various hosts and remote segments coordinated across a long live-programming window. Las Vegas material for the forthcoming edition is identified as pre-taped, a common production approach that permits a multi-location show to incorporate major segments without presenting every moment as live.
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Last year’s guests and performers ranged broadly across pop, rock, rap, country and legacy acts. Diana Ross appeared in Times Square, while the wider lineup included 4 Non Blondes, 50 Cent, AJR, The All-American Rejects, BigXthaPlug, Chance the Rapper, Chappell Roan, Charlie Puth, Ciara, Daddy Yankee, Demi Lovato, Goo Goo Dolls, Mariah Carey, OneRepublic, Pitbull, Post Malone and Zara Larsson, among many others.
That wide musical range is part of the special’s practical assignment: it must serve as a national celebration rather than a genre-specific concert. The 2027 performers have not been named, so last year’s lineup should be read as an indication of the show’s scale and variety, not as confirmation that any individual artist will return.
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The audience case behind the streaming expansion
The 2026 telecast delivered its best ratings result in four years. At the midnight point, when 2025 became 2026, 30.01 million viewers were tuned in based on Live+3 measurements. During the 11:30 p.m. ET to 12:28 a.m. ET period, the broadcast averaged 19.606 million viewers and posted a 5.00 rating among adults ages 18–49.
Live+3 is an audience-measurement window that combines live viewing with viewing recorded or watched within three days. It is useful context for a major broadcast event because not every viewer watches at the exact moment of transmission. But the 30.01 million figure is specifically tied to the midnight moment, while the 19.606 million figure applies to the stated 58-minute interval. They measure different slices of the telecast and should not be treated as interchangeable averages.
The special also had an audio distribution component: it was simulcast across nearly 150 iHeartRadio stations and reached 2 million listeners, up 9% from the previous year. Together, the television, radio and now Disney+ elements show a strategy built around meeting a large live-event audience on multiple platforms.
For Disney+, the arrangement gives subscribers a prominent appointment-viewing event. That is a different proposition from a catalogue title that can be started at any time. A live holiday broadcast encourages audiences to tune in at a particular hour, participate in the same national countdown and potentially remain with the service over an extended evening of programming.
The on-air team announced so far
Seacrest’s return maintains the special’s central Times Square presence. Ora will again join him there, placing the show’s principal hosts at the New York location most closely associated with the U.S. countdown tradition.
Elsewhere, Hough and Gronkowski will handle Las Vegas content that has been described as pre-taped. Druski’s Chicago role adds another city to the announced hosting lineup. The information released so far does not define individual segment assignments beyond those locations, nor does it establish whether the final program will match the previous edition’s eight-hour duration.
That restraint is worth noting because large New Year’s Eve broadcasts can evolve considerably between an early host announcement and the completed program. Musical bookings, performance locations and individual countdown components remain to be announced. Until those details arrive, the most concrete change for the 2027 edition is the live Disney+ availability.
Production credits
Dick Clark’s New Year’s Rockin’ Eve with Ryan Seacrest 2027 is produced by Dick Clark Productions. Ryan Seacrest, Michael Dempsey, Jay Penske and Barry Adelman are executive producers.
The combination of a long-running ABC broadcast and first-time Disney+ simulcast places the forthcoming show in a broader multi-platform model, while its announced hosts preserve the familiar Times Square, Las Vegas and Chicago structure. More information, including the performers who will fill out the night’s music slate, is expected later.
