• by Wayne Friedman , January 11, 2022

Looking to pull in more live TV viewers, Roku is adding a “Live TV Zone” in its on-screen navigation.

Roku says a recent streaming survey shows that 61% of users -- without traditional pay TV -- watch live news “at least multiple times a week.” This makes it easier to access quickly.

Clicking on a new Live TV tab/box gives Roku users access to virtual pay TV providers.

Going further, users can then click on the Live TV Channel Guide, which offers access to more than 200 free live linear television channels -- a broad range of genres including news, sports, kids and family, lifestyle and Spanish-language entertainment

One area of live streaming that is seeing growth is sports.

In some of its recent research, findings indicated that while 62% of viewers watch sports via traditional pay TV channels, 42% watch sports via streaming platforms.

In terms of viewer satisfaction, Roku says 75% of users claim to be satisfied with the experience on streaming versus 80% who view sports via traditional pay TV platforms.

The research came from a July 24 and July 30, 2021 survey by the National Research Group on behalf of Roku, comprised of 2,852 18- to-70-year-olds in the U.S. who watch at least five hours of TV per week via traditional pay TV or a streaming service.