Advanced Television

Research: Chromecast Australia’s most popular DTV service

October 4, 2019

Findings from research firm Roy Morgan shows that Google Chromecast is Australia’s most popular digital television service, with 12.1 per cent owning the service. Uptake has more than doubled over the past three years.

The proportion of Australians who own digital television services has shown significant growth across all brands in the past three years. As of June 2019, 12.1 per cent of Australians aged 14 and over owned a Google Chromecast. This was followed by Apple TV (9.4 per cent), Foxtel Now box (7.7 per cent), Telstra TV (6.7 per cent), Fetch Mighty/Mini (5.5 per cent) and other digital television services (4.5 per cent).

The findings come from the comprehensive Roy Morgan Single Source survey, gathered via in-depth face-to-face interviews with over 50,000 Australians each year in their homes.

“Gone are the days when consumers were limited to programmes dished up by a small number of commercial and public television channels,” notes Roy Morgan CEO Michele Levine. “Nowadays, households enjoy a large amount of choice in their viewing.”

“Our data also reveals that more Amazon Prime Video, Kayo Sports, Netflix, Stan and YouTube Premium customers have a Google Chromecast service than any other digital TV device, which is consistent with many Chromecast customers being Technology Early Adopters.”

Roy Morgan’s Technology Adoption Segments split Australians into six segments based on their interest and use of technology.

  • Technology Early Adopters (17 per cent of Australians): Always first to purchase and use new technologies, these people are well educated with high incomes and risk-taking tendencies — 23 per cent of Technology Early Adopters use Google Chromecast.
  • Professional Technology Mainstream (18 per cent of Australians): Ambitious individuals who adopt technology fairly early for career and time-saving purposes.
  • Digital Life (14 per cent of Australians): Typically students and young part-time workers, fast to adapt to social media styles of technology.
  • Older Tech Explorers (9 per cent of Australians): Passionate about new tech but cautious about spending money on it.
  • Technology Traditionalists (24 per cent of Australians): Usually aged 45+, these individuals are wary of change and only adopt new technology once it’s become mainstream.
  • Technophobes (18 per cent of Australians): The oldest segment, technophobes aren’t so much scared of new technology as uninterested, preferring more traditional pursuits (TV, gardening, reading).

Google Chromecast experienced the largest percentage increase over the past three years (+6.8 per cent), followed by Telstra TV (+4.9 per cent), Apple TV (+0.8 per cent) and Foxtel Now box (+0.7 per cent since July 2018).

“Given recent strong industry growth and the fact that digital services are still in their infancy, we can expect the proportion of Australians using Chromecast and other similar services to continue to increase rapidly in future years,” concludes Levine.

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