Is ‘The Polar Express’ on Netflix for Christmas 2020?

The Polar Express – Picture: Warner Brothers Pictures

The Polar Express has for many become a Christmas staple being on the must-watch list. Multiple regions of Netflix are streaming The Polar Express for Christmas 2020 and we’ll take you through where you can watch them and if you can’t on Netflix, where you’ll find it streaming instead.

Set on Christmas Eve, The Polar Express follows a young boy who is losing faith in Christmas jumping on the train helmed by Tom Hanks’s character who is the conductor. The adventure then sees the boy and new friends journey to the North Pole to visit Santa Clause.

Although the movie is often argued over when it comes to its aging animation style often being cited as being a strong case of the uncanny valley effect. The movie, however, did gain 3 Oscar nominations when it released in 2004 which is 16 years ago.

Why isn’t The Polar Express on Netflix in the United States?

Earlier in 2020, you were able to stream The Polar Express on Netflix US. It was added on April 1st, 2020 but swiftly departed in July 2020.

To understand what movies stream where and why you need to look at who owns the license. In the case of The Polar Express, Warner Brothers own the distribution rights so, therefore, essentially chooses where the movie streams. It often lends it out to other providers in 3-month stints.

We were expecting Warner Brothers to stop licensing out the movie and keep it for its own HBO Max service which launched in May 2020. To date, though, that’s not happened.

As per previous years, Netflix’s DVD service does still carry the movie so you can rent from there.

Is The Polar Express on Netflix in other regions?

In the United Kingdom, the movie is once again streaming on NowTV for the holiday season. You can also watch in the United Kingdom if you have a Sky Movies subscription.

Netflix Australia is lucky for 2020, though. Netflix AU got the movie added on the week of November 20th, 2020 as part of the weekly additions and although we don’t know how long it’ll be there for, it should be available over the Christmas period.

Other regions of Netflix are streaming The Polar Express in 2020. In fact, 20 regions (up from 17 last year) of Netflix currently have The Polar Express. These include:

That’s all we have for now, should it get added or taken away from any regions over the Christmas period, we’ll update this post.

Let us know in the comments if you wanted to watch The Polar Express on Netflix.