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‘Yellowstone’ Season 5 Will Be Split Into Two Halves

Get ready for a bigger, badder Yellowstone come Season 5. Paramount is shaking things up for the return of the #1 show on cable television.

Courtesy of their whopping $200 million production deal with Taylor Sheridan, ViacomCBS is expanding the Yellowstone Universe in a big way. The second prequel series, 1932, is well underway. 1883 is getting a second season, and Paramount just shared plans to up the ante for Yellowstone Season 5.

Specifically, ViacomCBS is expanding the next season of the most popular show on cable by 4 episodes. Season 5 will be 14 episodes as a result, but we’re not getting them all at once.

Yellowstone Season 5 will be split into two 7-episode halves, Wall Street Journal confirms Wednesday. And as was the case with Season 4, 5 will be used to launch several new properties from Sheridan.

“We want to double down on that momentum and not waste it,” offers Chris McCarthy, chief executive of ViacomCBS Media Networks and MTV Entertainment studios. McCarthy co-produces all current Yellowstone properties with Sheridan’s 101 Studios. The big news hit Tuesday during a ViacomCBS presentation for investors. But as today proves, that was only the beginning.

‘Yellowstone’ Season 5 Will Guide All of Paramount Moving Forward

Going forward, ViacomCBS will be Paramount Global; shepherd of this Taylor Sheridan Universe. Placing the majority of their eggs in Sheridan’s basket has already proven a wildly successful venture. So while fans may be nervous to have Yellowstone Season 5 split into two halves, the end result will be 14 episodes over the usual 10.

The pushback from audiences is already evident, however. Yellowstone viewers worry this oversaturation of the property will be its death. But so long as Sheridan can keep up the quality he’s famous for, there should be little reason to worry.

In kind, Paramount is striking while the iron is hot. The massive momentum of Yellowstone Season 4 (which shattered numerous cable television records in 2021 and 2022) is driving the studio. Last season brought an average of 10.4 million viewers for Paramount Network – near unheard of numbers for cable in a streaming-dominated world.

Meanwhile, 1883 continues to perform as Paramount+’s #1 streaming title worldwide, far outpacing all other Paramount properties on their streaming platform. This led to an immediate greenlighting of Yellowstone‘s second prequel, 1932, which will offer fans a glimpse of the in-between generation of Duttons during America’s Depression era.

According to WSJ, it’s all-hands-on-deck for the continuation of all the above, including Yellowstone Season 5. Taylor Sheridan is currently in the “outline phase” for 1932. The trade cites a 10-month window for production, however, which 1883 faced, as well.

In short: it’s a damn good time to be an Outsider and a “Yellowstone” fan.