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Vevo Viewers Now Prefer Mobile To Desktop

What’s more surprising: Justin Bieber’s staying power, the immense popularity of music videos in 2016, or the fact that Vevo users now do most of their viewing via mobile?

While their fate looked uncertain for a while, music videos are clearly riding a wave of interest in anything that streams. As such, Vevo is now seeing 20 billion monthly worldwide views, which represents an annual increase of 26%.

You might think people would prefer to watch videos on a bigger screen, but mobile is, well, mobile, which obviously makes it easier for folks to fit it into their busy schedules. It’s no wonder, then, that Vevo saw mobile usage rise to 48% this year, overtaking desktop’s 44% share for the first ever.

That, of course, leaves Bieber’s durability, which is a wonder considering the competition.   

This year, Bieber was responsible for three entries in the worldwide chart -- and topped both the U.K. and U.S. chart -- with his videos from "PURPOSE: The Movement." Besting all other videos on Vevo this year, "Sorry" has seen a massive 1.8 billion views.

That said, The Chainsmokers are the biggest success story of the year, hitting the charts with "Closer" and their lyric video. They appear in top tens across the board for 2016.

This has also been an interesting year for views around the Vevo catalogue outside of new releases. On the day that David Bowie died, for instance, his catalogue saw the most views for any artist in a single day, with nearly 51 million across his videos on Vevo.

Calvin Harris’ "This is What You Came For" has also seen huge views, crossing the 1 billion mark in 2016. Adele’s "Hello" has also stayed at the top, with 1.2 billion worldwide views for the year.

Earlier this year, Vevo released some research suggesting that music video content is about 200% more likely to be shared on social networks than audio tracks.

Meanwhile, more than half of Vevo viewers reported that they share music content with friends, while 55% said they watch videos shared with them.

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