Crackle grew out of Grouper, a 2004 start-up combining file sharing, messaging and video streaming, which Sony Pictures bought in August 2006. In July 2007 Sony rebranded it as Crackle, a multi-platform video network and studio, and it was soon offering web-original fiction: in September 2009 IGN described The Bannen Way, a series about a con man due that January, as the latest of Crackle's web-original shows.
Seinfeld in a car
Its best-known original arrived on 19 July 2012. Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee paired Jerry Seinfeld and a guest comedian with a vintage car and a coffee stop, and by May 2015 it had been streamed nearly 100 million times. In January 2017, though, it was announced that the show would move to Netflix, which took the first nine seasons in January 2018 and debuted the tenth that year.
Alongside it, Crackle built a wider slate. In April 2015 it announced its first animated series, the stop-motion comedy SuperMansion, and its first hour-long drama, The Art of More; in March 2018 it premiered The Oath, a drama created by a former Los Angeles County sheriff's deputy and starring Sean Bean. Sony sold a majority stake to Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment in March 2019 and the remainder in December 2020.
Retreat and closure
The international footprint shrank first. Sony Pictures Television closed Crackle's UK operation on 1 April 2014, Canada followed in June 2018 and Latin America in April 2019. In the US, Chicken Soup for the Soul filed for bankruptcy in June 2024; within weeks the case became a Chapter 7 liquidation, and a trustee kept the Crackle website running for US viewers until June 2025.
Key dates
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Grouper becomes Crackle
Sony rebrands its video start-up as a network and studio.
Source: Wikipedia: Crackle (service)
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Comedians in Cars Getting Coffee premieres
Jerry Seinfeld's talk show debuts on Crackle.
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Crackle closes in the UK
Sony Pictures Television shuts the service's UK operation.
Source: Wikipedia: Crackle (service)
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Owner placed in liquidation
A US court converts Chicken Soup for the Soul Entertainment's bankruptcy to Chapter 7.
Source: Wikipedia: Crackle (service)