content management technology
PR Newswire
Published on : Dec 21, 2023
Television viewing levels surged again in November to the highest levels recorded since January 2023, according to Nielsen's latest report of The Gauge™, the media measurement company's monthly snapshot of total broadcast, cable and streaming consumption that occurs via television. Overall TV usage in November was up 5.7% compared with October, primarily driven by the week of Thanksgiving (11/20/23 - 11/26/23), when viewing levels peaked and measured over 14% higher than the previous month.
November marked a fourth consecutive month of growth for broadcast, as the category added 0.3 points to tie its highest share of 2023 (January) with 24.9% of overall TV usage. Month-over-month, broadcast usage was up 7% in November, largely propelled by the week of Thanksgiving when usage jumped 18.4%.
Broadcast sports viewership was 21% higher in November versus October, leading the popular genre to account for one-third (33%) of all broadcast consumption. While overall broadcast usage decreased 5.3% (-0.8 pts.) on a yearly basis, viewership to broadcast sports was up 2.8% compared with 2022.
Due to cable usage representing the smallest increase in November (+1.3%), the category gave up 1.2 share points to finish the month at a category-low 28.3% of TV. The feature film genre demonstrated typical seasonal lifts (+26%) and accounted for the largest portion of cable consumption at 19%. Cable news viewing slipped slightly (-0.6% vs. October) and finished at 18.4% of all cable usage, while monthly sports viewership dropped 16%.
Cable usage in November was 13% lower than 2022 levels, and the category has lost 3.5 share points on a year-over-year basis.
Despite a 4.3% monthly lift in streaming usage in November, the larger increase in overall TV consumption forced a loss of 0.5 share points for the streaming category, bringing it to 36.1% of TV. Similar to broadcast, streaming usage peaked during the holiday week when viewing jumped over 10% compared with October levels.
Streaming platform and content highlights include:
Linear (live TV) streaming via MVPD (multichannel video programming distributors) and vMVPD (virtual multichannel video programming distributors) apps represented 6.4% of total television usage in October. Linear streaming is included in the appropriate broadcast or cable category, and is not included in the streaming category.