• by Wayne Friedman , March 20, 2020

Vizio’s Inscape, the smart TV data business, says it has seen higher consumption both for linear and streaming TV viewing over the recent weekend period, partly due to COVID-19 issues that are keeping people at home.

Linear TV viewing and streaming OTT viewing are up 10% for a two-day period this week -- March 14-15 versus March 7-8. Vizio looked to isolate changes in viewing habits over the weekend due to more people staying home and quarantining.

In addition, Vizio’s Inscape said that over that period the average OTT session was 34 minutes, compared to 19 minutes for the average linear session time right now.

Overall there has been an 8.6% increase in sessions week-over-week -- March 8-15 versus March 2-7. Inscape has a measurement panel of 14 million opt-on TV sets.

Inscape says the top five shows that have been binge-watched from March 13 to 15 are "Law & Order: SVU," "WestWorld," "NCIS: Los Angeles," "The Office," and "Big Bang Theory."

Vizio Ads -- the TV set maker’s business which sells TV ads on smart TVs -- says there has been a 19% increase in advertising-supported video-on-demand apps, and 9% higher for all overall TV apps.

Vizio Ads data comes from an anonymous panel of 9.6 million smart TV set users.