Its fifth-season premiere in Novemberdrew the biggest audience of any TV show last year.

But you won’t find any Yellowstone on Paramount Plus, except spinoffs.

As confusing as that is, it was somewhat by design.

In this case, that meant Paramount’s biggest show isn’t on Paramount Plus at all.

(In retrospect, that may have been anespecially bad bet.)

Paramount online grid is where Yellowstone’s new season runs first.

The second distinction to know is that Peacock is the only subscription streaming service with Yellowstone episodes.

Most often, that means having cable, satellite or alive-channel streaming servicelikeYouTube TVorPhilo.

(Some people who have Comcast or Spectrum can geta deal on Peacock’s premium tiers.)

And Paramount has ordered a whole stable of shows either related to Yellowstone or unrelated but produced by Sheridan.

Unlike Paramount, some streaming services have been aggressive in getting their titles back to their own services.

Disney has been firm in letting its deals expire for anything it previously licensed out to other services.

WarnerMedia’s Warner Bros. licensed all those movies toNBCUniversal years ago in an epic deal.

That put NBCUniversal’s Peacock in line to stream them rather than HBO Max.

But WarnerMedia has snagged them back repeatedly, in an effort to boost HBO Max with a popular franchise.

Paramount Plus, however, has been more willing to license its top titles elsewhere.

Part of the reason is that licensing can be a lucrative business.

That money comes from an array of licenses, from TV syndication to Paw Patrol stuffed animals and costumes.

But part of licensing is also farming out titles like Yellowstone and others to Paramount Plus' direct rivals.

And Paramount has a big back catalog to tap into: roughly 140,000 TV episodes and 4,000 films.

The company has said it doesn’t want all that on Paramount Plus.

“We can’t keep all that for ourself.

It doesn’t make sense,” CEO Bob Bakish said as Paramount Plus was preparing for launch.

“It’s too much.”

It’s a perverse sort of logic.

But Netflix has more than230 million membersworldwide, versus Paramount Plus' 46 million.

Unfortunately, Paramount isn’t gaining much reach for Yellowstone by having it on Peacock.

Then in 2025, Paramount Plus will get the full back-catalog of South Park in the US.

But so far, Paramount has been silent about clawing back the rights to Yellowstone.