Survey: New Zealand embracing streaming
March 21, 2018
A Canstar Blue survey has revealed that 69 per cent of Kiwis think streaming services offer value for money – a meteoric rise from the 5 per cent of customers who thought so at this time last year.
Canstar Blue general manager Jose George commented: “The number of streaming service providers and the resulting choice and flexibility they offer has opened up a whole new world to consumers. Until relatively recently our TV choice was terrestrial TV, or paid service, Sky. One was generally thought to offer limited choice and the other often hit the headlines over pricing. In contrast streaming services continue to evolve, offering exclusive TV series on standard or HD services at a fraction of the cost, sometimes even free. You don’t have to scratch too deep to see why there’s been such a surge in consumer sentiment.”
As mentioned, price and choice are two things that are often talked about and the colossal rise in customers saying their service offers value for money suggest this to be true. But behind the big-ticket shows such as Stranger Things, Orange Is The New Black and old favourites such as Breaking Bad, there’s been a lot happening to make it quicker and easier to download top shows.
Since 2014 New Zealand has seen:
· $6.63billion invested in telecoms
· Fixed wireless and satellite connections rise from 24,000 to 122,000
· Total fixed broadband connections rise form 1.41million to 1.58million
In addition, New Zealand currently boasts fixed broadband average download speeds of 14.7mbps (megabytes per second), comparing favourably to the 11.1mbps users in Australia enjoy.
George continues: “Evidently, Kiwis love the Internet and the services it allows us to tap into and it’s great that we’re enjoying better, faster services that have enhanced our streaming experiences. Unfortunately, our survey also found that although we rate value for money highly, when it comes to our broadband services, 42 per cent of people have got no idea how much data they are using. This means they’re not able to calculate if they are getting a good deal with their provider and if there are potential savings to be made. If streaming is important to you, a rule of thumb is around 1GB of data per hour of viewing but this rises to 3GB if you’re watching in HD.”