By Erich Schwartzel

Walt Disney Co.'s flagship streaming service, Disney+, has surpassed 100 million subscribers, the company said Tuesday, a symbolic win that emphasizes how the company has been the most successful of the new entrants trying to chip away at Netflix Inc.'s direct-to-consumer dominance.

Disney+ reached 100 million subscribers in its first 16 months of operation.

Powered by fan favorites like "The Mandalorian" and "WandaVision," the service is on track to meet the company's projection of 260 million subscribers by 2024. The company last reported 94.9 million subscribers as of Jan. 2.

Disney Chief Executive Bob Chapek reiterated at a shareholder meeting Tuesday that the company's streaming strategy is his priority, noting that Disney has set a bullish target of adding more than 100 new titles to the service each year. Leading streaming platform Netflix said in January that it had 203.7 million subscribers.

Disney's torrential growth, which has been faster than at rivals such as Amazon Prime Video, speaks to the company's accidental timing in releasing a new service months before nationwide shutdown orders, as well as its strategy to ship new programming to the service as needed so viewers stay engaged week to week. Disney+ launched with a massive library of movies and TV shows that has played a large role in hooking families -- and an introductory price of $6.99 a month, considerably less expensive than other services. (It will start costing $7.99 a month later this year.)

The company's original-programming strategy has relied on fan-favorite hits such as "The Mandalorian," a Star Wars spinoff that premiered when the service launched in November 2019 and offered it its first viral star in the creature known by fans as "Baby Yoda." When Covid-19 shut down U.S. theaters, Disney shipped theatrical releases such as "Hamilton" to the service, which provided subscription bumps and played a critical role in convincing viewers to keep paying their monthly fee.

Rather than release its shows in a bingeable dump of episodes, Disney has doled out new episodes of "WandaVision" and other hits week to week. It and other forthcoming Marvel shows, such as "The Falcon and the Winter Soldier," slot into larger narratives that will play out in subsequent theatrical film releases. Production timelines were disrupted by Covid-19 for some of its most highly anticipated shows, which is one reason why would-be theatrical releases such as "Hamilton" went to Disney+.

The dozens of shows and movies that Disney is planning to release in the coming years lean heavily on its beloved library of characters. Peter Pan, Luke Skywalker and Moana are a few of the characters from older properties that are being dusted off and recast in reboots and sequels that will premiere exclusively on the service.

Disney's shareholder meeting came almost exactly one year after Covid-19 rewrote the rules of American business. Last March, Disney theme parks and U.S. theaters closed, a shutdown that is only recently starting to loosen. Wall Street has remained focused on Disney's streaming plans, a company reorientation that has sent Disney shares to records.

Parts of Disney's traditional businesses will likely return to some semblance of normalcy in the coming months. California officials announced a path to reopening last week that puts the company's Disneyland theme park on track to open at reduced capacity in late April. Only 45% of North American movie theaters are currently open, though Disney reiterated that it expects to give a theatrical release to its Marvel Studios superhero film "Black Widow" when it comes out in May.

The pandemic has helped boost Disney as a streaming shop these days, evidenced by fan enthusiasm for recent hits such as "WandaVision" and the company's decision to release its latest animated film, "Raya and the Last Dragon," as a $30 option on the service. "Raya" was available on Disney+ in addition to a theatrical release that opened to a paltry $8.6 million last weekend. Cinemark Holdings, the nation's No. 3 exhibitor, didn't show "Raya."

Disney is exploring different strategies in various markets to maintain its subscriber growth, including an option in some overseas territories to couple Disney+ with more adult-oriented programming available on its Star platform. By investing heavily in new shows and movies, Disney is betting it can retain subscribers even after popular series like "The Mandalorian" end.

Questions loom about the future of Disney+, particularly in how aggressively Mr. Chapek decides to use it to shake up traditional theatrical distribution. Other traditional studios, such as AT&T Inc.'s Warner Bros., have opted for seismic overhauls to distribution models. In the case of Warner Bros., that has meant releasing the studio's entire 2021 theatrical slate on its HBO Max service. Streaming strategies at Comcast Corp.'s NBCUniversal and Viacom Inc.'s Paramount Pictures have created a patchwork of strategies across Hollywood.

Mr. Chapek has been in the CEO role for a little more than a year, and his predecessor, Robert Iger, said he would stop serving as executive chairman at the end of this year. All 10 members of Disney's board of directors, several of whom served during Mr. Iger's tenure, were re-elected by shareholders on Tuesday.

Write to Erich Schwartzel at erich.schwartzel@wsj.com

(END) Dow Jones Newswires

03-09-21 1638ET