Gracenote: SVODs Expanded Sports Slates in Q1

Nielsen’s Gracenote has found a significant expansion of sports content on the big global SVOD services in the first quarter of this year, most notably at Disney+ and Netflix.

Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV+, Disney+, Netflix and Paramount+ collectively increased sports programs by more than 72 percent in Q1. The stat is revealed in the latest update to the Gracenote Data Hub. Since October 2024, Disney+ and Netflix expanded their sports slates by 471 percent and nearly 100 percent, respectively.

For Disney+, this increase came largely by way of the addition of ESPN content, with the platform now accounting for almost 33 percent of available sports programming, just behind Amazon’s 35 percent with Netflix at 23 percent.

The study also found that Prime Video, Apple TV+, Disney+, Netflix and Paramount+ increased their catalogs by 6.7 percent in the quarter, with a 5.4 percent increase in TV and 7.6 percent in movies. Prime Video is the largest distributor of video content, with 69 percent of the available programming, up from 67.8 percent in Q1 2024.

Across all five services, drama is the top genre, but it no longer holds that position at Disney+, where it was knocked off its perch by documentary, comedy, children and adventure.

“Live sports programming continues to be an important driver of user growth, retention and engagement for streaming services,” said Bill Michels, chief product officer at Gracenote. “We are also seeing that relevant metadata, such as synopses, scores, highlights and imagery, have the power to help streamers build world-class user experiences that keep users engaged beyond the live game.”