As streaming becomes ever more ubiquitous, new findings from Leichtman Research Group suggest that consumers are more willing to stack up subscriptions to multiple services.
In its 14th annual study of streaming, using a sample of 1,990 households, the company found that 78% of them have a subscription to Netflix, Amazon Prime or Hulu, up from 69% in 2018 and 52% in 2015.
The increase is even steeper in terms of homes subscribing to more than one of the three, with 55% now in that category, That’s up from 43% in 2018 and 20% in 2015.
While pay-TV subscriptions are in secular decline, there is a significant correlation between pay-TV subscribers and SVOD households. In the study, 58% of TV households get both, compared with 20% getting SVOD only and 16% getting pay-TV only. (The remaining 6% get neither.)
Before a major wave of new SVOD launches in recent months, with Apple, Disney, WarnerMedia and NBCUniversal all entering the game, conventional wisdom held that three was the limit per household. But with pay-TV continuing to fade from the scene, streaming is increasingly viable given the ease of starting and stopping subscriptions and the lower cost compared with a full pay-TV package.
The Leichtman study also included a dozen newer services, including Disney+, HBO Max and BET+, finding that 82% of all households have at least one of them, while 49% have three or more.
Subscribers aren’t just paying for the services, Leichtman Research said — they are using them more. Each day, 40% of adults stream an SVOD service, up from 30% in 2018 and 16% in 2015. Younger adults are the most active streamers, with ages 18-44 accounting for 63% of daily SVOD users.
“The adoption and use of these established SVOD services along with newer direct-to-consumer streaming video options have increased over the past year, spurred more recently by the impact of the coronavirus pandemic,” said Bruce Leichtman, president and principal analyst for Leichtman Research Group.
Deadline's Dade Hayes contributed to this post.
