Streaming Achieves Record High of U.S. Viewing Time

Streaming captured 47.5 percent of television viewing in December, achieving the largest share ever reported in Nielsen’s The Gauge.

Streaming dominance in December was anchored by a Christmas Day that saw usage soar to 55.1 billion viewing minutes, shattering the previous single-day streaming record by 8 percent and marking only the second time in TV history where daily streaming volume surpassed 50 billion minutes.

Christmas Day streaming was driven by back-to-back NFL games on Netflix, followed by the release of new Stranger Things episodes, in addition to Prime Video’s late NFL game. Together, Netflix and Prime Video accounted for 22.5 percent of total TV usage across the day.

Streaming levels overall on Christmas soared to 54 percent of daily TV usage, the largest single-day share of TV ever recorded by the category. The streaming category exceeded 50 percent of daily TV usage twice in the month, having occurred for the first time ever on December 13.

Overall streaming usage was up 3 percent in December versus November. Netflix, Prime Video, The Roku Channel and Paramount Streaming achieved personal bests. Netflix viewership was up 10 percent month-over-month, driven by the release of Stranger Things. Prime Video surged 12 percent versus November, driven by four NFL Thursday Night Football games and new episodes of Fallout. The Roku Channel added 0.1 share point from November to secure an all-time monthly high. And Paramount Streaming was up 10 percent from November.

Across traditional TV, broadcast viewership represented 21.4 percent of total TV watch time in December, while cable accounted for 20.2 percent. CBS and FOX had the top broadcast programs.

Cable sports programming experienced a 16 percent viewing lift in December to represent 9 percent of total cable viewing. NFL games represented the top five cable telecasts throughout the month.