Only 19% of U.S. consumers now pay for digital subscriptions, according to "Succeeding With Subscriptions," a study by Toolkits and National Research Group.
Of
those polled, 54% have never subscribed and 19% previously did so. The remainder don’t know.
But digital subscriptions are expected to generate over $11 billion by 2025, the study
states.
By generation, 61% of Gen Z has two to five subscriptions, narrowly beating millennials and Gen X, at 60% apiece. Only 43% of boomers fall into this
category.
But boomers are mostly likely to own one subscription (55%), versus 30% for Gen X, 23% for millennials and 27% for Gen Z. At 17%, millennials lead when it comes to have five or
more subscriptions.
That doesn’t mean content is equally used: 46% subscribe to at least one publication they access less than once per
month.
But, in general, they say they access content:
- Multiple times per day—32%
- Daily—26%
- Multiple times per week—26%
- Once per week—9%
- Less than
once per week—5%
- Never or almost never—3%
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Those who subscribe are paying for these types of content:
- News and current affairs—37%
- Media and entertainment—33%
- Sports—26%
- Cooking—22%
- Lifestyle—22%
- Hobbies and niche interests—20%
- Science
and technology—20%
- Business and finance—20%
- Fashion—18%
- Kids, family and
parenting—18%
- Podcast networks—15%
- Art, design and literature—14%
- Blogs—11%
These are additional findings from a survey of 2,509 consumers conducted in August 2022 by Toolkit and National Research Group. In November, they
reported that 53% of consumers attempt to bypass paywalls on publishers’ websites. And 69% avoid clicking through when they know the site has one.