For a third consecutive month, streaming’s share of total TV viewing in the US reached a record high in April, according to Nielsen’s monthly The Gauge report. Time spent streaming accounted for 44.3 per cent of total TV viewing in April, adding a half-point over March and 1.7 points since January.

Compared with April 2024, streaming usage has increased 15 per cent and gained 5.9 share points, where broadcast has declined 7 per cent and lost 1.4 share points, and cable has dropped 16 per cent and lost 4.6 share points. However, these changes have put an even stronger emphasis on media companies’ multichannel (i.e. traditional TV and streaming) and multi-platform (multiple streaming services) content distribution strategies, which, in turn, have contributed to the consistent increases in streaming viewership.

April’s top streaming title, ABC´s Grey’s Anatomy (pictured), is a prime example of both multi-channel and multi-platform distribution success, says Nielsen. The medical drama racked up 3.9 billion viewing minutes across Hulu (within ‘Disney’ streaming) and Netflix in April, and continued to engage viewers with new episodes on both ABC and Hulu. Season 21 of the series streams exclusively on Hulu and accounted for 10 per cent of Grey’s Anatomy’s total streaming viewership for April, despite representing just 3 per cent of its episode count. Netflix represented about 60 per cent of its streaming total.

Max (within ‘Warner Bros Discovery’ streaming) again benefited from new episodes of HBO’s The White Lotus, which garnered 3.7 billion viewing minutes on the platform and claimed the second most-watched streaming title in April. This consecutive monthly boost from The White Lotus helped WBD’s streaming offering maintain its 1.5 per cent share of total TV.

YouTube and The Roku Channel each notched platform-best shares of TV in April. Like the overall streaming category, YouTube also hit a platform high for a third straight month with 12.4 per cent of total TV watch-time (+0.4 pt. vs. March). Since January, YouTube has added 1.6 points to its share of TV, and is up 2.8 points since April 2024. The Roku Channel gained 0.2 share point over March to achieve 2.4 per cent of overall TV viewing this month. The Roku Channel’s viewership has increased 21 per cent since November, the same interval when it began offering access to Max and other streaming platforms from within the service. Year-over-year, The Roku Channel leads all reported distributors with a 67 per cent increase.

Paramount comprised 8.9 per cent of total TV watch-time in April and exhibited the largest monthly share increase among media companies (+0.4 points, which, based on unrounded figures, was slightly larger than YouTube’s increase). Viewership gains to its CBS broadcast affiliates drove more than half of Paramount’s monthly growth. NBCUniversal rounded out the top four media distributors in April with an 8.2 per cent share of TV, up from 8 per cent in March.

Time spent watching broadcast TV in April accounted for 20.8 per cent total usage (+0.3 pt.). The top genres within broadcast were dramas, representing 30 per cent of viewing, followed by news at 14 per cent. The Men’s NCAA Basketball Championship game drew April’s largest broadcast audience with 18.3 million viewers on CBS (up from 7.5 million in 2024 on TBS). The Masters golf tournament finale on CBS also saw a significant audience increase from 2024, up 36 per cent to 13 million viewers this year.

Cable gained 0.5 share points compared to March to represent 24.5 per cent of total TV watch-time this month. ESPN’s coverage of the NFL Draft on April 24th averaged 6.4 million viewers and was the most watched cable telecast in April, while Fox News Channel’s The Five represented the next nine of the top ten telecasts. The first round of the NBA playoffs also contributed to cable sports gains in April, with ESPN and TNT hosting five games apiece and averaging 3.1 and 2.8 million viewers, respectively.

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Categories: Articles, Cable, Consumer Behaviour, OTT, Premium, Research, VOD

Tags: ESPN, Grey’s Anatomy, HBO, Hulu, nielsen, the gauge