New Australian Multi-Screen Report Shows TV’s Dominance

SYDNEY: The latest Australian Multi-Screen Report—from Regional TAM, OzTAM and Nielsen—finds that despite the extensive choices of devices, channels and platforms, traditional television remains the most-watched screen.

Each week on average 88.1 percent of Australians (20.67 million people) watch at least some broadcast TV on in-home sets (free-to-air and/or subscription channels). More people are using their TV sets for things in addition to watching live broadcast television, thanks to increasing take-up of internet-connected TVs and/or devices attached to the TV. Looking across all screens, devices and any type of video across the population as a whole: 86.4 percent of viewing (90:01) is TV content watched on in-home sets within 28 days of original broadcast. Connected devices account for 13.6 percent.

Longer-tail playback viewing continues to grow in Oz: 1.8 percent of all broadcast TV watched on in-home sets in any four-week period is time-shifted between 8 and 28 days later. In prime time, that proportion is 1.7 percent.

Craig Johnson, the managing director of media at Nielsen, said: “There’s no denying that technology continues to transform the video experience with each passing day. With more and more devices in use within our homes, household viewing habits are evolving and expanding, offering more media touch points than ever before.”

OzTAM’s CEO, Doug Peiffer, said: “The latest Multi-Screen Report shows people using their various screens to catch up with TV content at all times of the day. This ability to move from one screen to the next and back again keeps people close to their favorite TV content. While viewing on connected devices is currently a small proportion of overall viewing, this behavior is gaining momentum and broadcasters are smart to make their content available across all screens.”

Regional TAM’s chairman and general manager of Prime Television, Tony Hogarth, said: “Regional Australians continue to watch free-to-air broadcast television on the main screen and predominately consume the content live. Broadcast television continues to deliver strong reach and in Regional TAM markets our viewers spent on average just over 100 hours per month watching television, that is almost six hours more per month compared to the national average.”