Disney has revealed plans to spend US$33 billion (A$46.3b) on new movies and shows in 2022, as it continues towards its mission to become the world’s biggest streaming service.

This will be an US$8 billion increase from 2021, where $25 billion was spent on new content. By comparison, Netlfix, the world’s largest streamer, plans to spend ‘just’ US$17 billion on new programming in 2022.

“The increase is driven by higher spend to support our DTC [direct-to-consumer or streaming] expansion and generally assumes no significant disruptions to production due to COVID-19,” the company wrote in its annual report.

Competition will also comes from a new player. Warner Media and Discovery will soon merge, along with its various content houses, such as TLC, HBO Max, CNN, Animal Planet, and the Warner Bros movie studio.

CEO David Zaslav has said the merged company plans to spend $20 billion on content in company’s first year.