Analyst: US SVoD homes can access 100K hours of content
July 9, 2020
A study by Ampere Analysis has revealed the changing habits of SVoD households in the US. The streaming market is becoming increasingly crowded, with more hours of content available on demand than ever before. Ampere has meshed its consumer polling data on the different services to which US households subscribe, with its content tracking data on the catalogues of those services.
This reveals that the average US SVoD household has access to almost 100,000 hours of content, delivered via 3.8 different services. It would take 11 years to watch it all back-to-back, and nearly 70 years if the average viewer watched an average of four hours per day. The main factors driving this increase in content availability are consumer uptake of Amazon Prime’s booming portfolio and the addition of new services such as Disney+ to the household mix.
Households with young kids subscribe to the most services
Households with young kids have access to nearly five different SVoD services, more than any other demographic. This is up significantly from 3.5 in the same period last year, largely due to the launch of Disney+, and the high uptake of the family-friendly service in the group. The content available to this demographic group via the video-on-demand services in their household now stands at an average of 102,000 hours, reflecting the variety of entertainment required in a household featuring people of many different ages. But even adults who live alone have an average of 3.1 services, and thus can access substantial amounts of video, with the average one-person SVoD household having 85,500 hours – almost 10 years – of content at their fingertips.
Apple and Disney’s launch grow content stacking
The launch and success of both Disney+ and Apple TV+ has driven growth in the number of services households can access and – to a lesser extent, given the smaller catalogues of both – the volume of content available in the average SVoD household. Almost one third of US SVoD households subscribed to Disney+ in Q1 2020. The service comes with a 4,200-hour catalogue and thus adds an average of 1,400 hours of content to the typical SVoD household’s portfolio.
Amazon has more than doubled its content catalogue in the US since Q3 2017 according to Ampere Analytics data. Given Amazon’s expansive catalogue, the 60 per cent of SVoD households who have both Netflix and Amazon accounts can access over 100,000 hours of TV shows and movies.
“Consumers already have a vast amount of content at their disposal, and a US household who subscribes to both Netflix and Amazon currently has access to more than 100,000 hours of content from those two services alone,” notes Toby Holleran, Senior Analyst at Ampere Analysis. “As the market fragments further with additional direct-to-consumer services and households hit a spending ceiling, consumers will become more selective about their SVoD choices. The more expensive services, alongside those without a clear brand and proposition, will find the going gets tougher.”