Bowen Yang Almost Left SNL Earlier, but Says He Is ‘So Glad’ He Came Back Before Leaving for Good

Bowen Yang is looking back at his time on Saturday Night Live with a smile.

The comedian signed off from SNL after a seven-season run with an emotional final sketch featuring Ariana Grande and Cher on the show’s Dec. 20th broadcast.

A five-time Emmy nominee, Yang became SNL‘s first Chinese American cast member when he joined in 2019 and one of its first openly gay stars.

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Three weeks after his final appearance on the show, Yang addressed his departure on the Wednesday, Jan. 7 edition of the Las Culturistas with Matt Rogers and Bowen Yang podcast titled “Exit Interview (The Cathartic Episode).”

“This is honestly what’s behind it: It’s time. You would do seven seasons, and then you would scoot,” he said.

“COVID and the current media landscape, the current entertainment ecosystem, is so turbulent that people have completely valid reasons for staying longer, or, in a lot of cases, don’t have the privilege of staying on as long as they would like to,” he continued. “I have this very beautiful thing where I get to say that I stayed on exactly as long as I wanted to.”

Back in April 2025, Yang told PEOPLE that he was sure he would leave the show “at some point” but didn’t know “what the vision is yet.”

“I was maybe unsure about going back in the summer, and I’m so glad I did,” Yang said on the podcast.

Yang also reflected on his final sketch, in which he played a Delta One Lounge employee working his last shift, and revealed he was unsure whether the segment would air.

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“I was like ‘there’s a million reasons why I could get cut. Nothing is guaranteed,’ ” he recalled. “Like that is sort of in a nutshell, like it kind of is perfectly like illustrative of what that job is, and it like was resonant all the way through to the end. And I feel, really this word is meaningless, I think maybe now, but like so grateful.”