Millennials Favor Video Game Subscriptions Vs. Pay TV
- by Wayne Friedman , June 11, 2019
Now millennial consumers buy more video gaming subscriptions than pay TV subscriptions.
A new study from consulting firm Deloitte says 53% of millennials have a video game subscription versus 51% for millennials with a pay TV subscription.
A year ago, video gaming subscriptions among millennials were at 44% and pay TV subscriptions came in at 52%. There are an estimated 73 million U.S. millennials between the ages of 20 and 35.
The study says 48% of mobile-dominant gamers watch more than five hours per week of TV shows, compared to 42% for video game players overall.
Mobile-dominant game players watch 21 hours of live broadcast TV per week, compared to 18 hours for all gamers and 20 hours for all consumers.
Overall, 30% of U.S. consumers pay for a gaming subscription service, and 41% play video games at least weekly.
Supplementing all are gamers who watch video gaming on TV -- so-called esports. Among gamers, 40% watch esports events at least once a week. And 25% of gamers who watch esports events tune in for more than four hours per week.
Deloitte says gamers use major platforms such as Amazon’s Twitch and Alphabet’s YouTube to watch Esports.
Yet Nielsen says that something like 70- 75% of millennials watch "pay TV" in a week and even more watch one or more "TV" shows over a longer period---like a month.