OTT, Streaming Subscription Revenues To Top Legacy Pay TV In 2025
- by Wayne Friedman , March 8, 2024
Next year, OTT and streaming subscription revenue will for the first time are projected to top traditional pay TV subscription revenues -- cable, satellite and telco -- rising 9% in 2025 to $71.92 billion, according to eMarketer.
Legacy pay TV subscription revenues are projected to get to $62.51 billion in 2025 -- a 46.5% share. In 2025, OTT revenues will account for more than half (53.5%) of overall U.S. video subscription revenues.
Continued cord-cutting subscribers, now trending at around 10% declines for the last several years, has eaten into legacy pay TV revenue.
It is estimated that OTT/streaming subscription revenues will grow 12% this year to $66.2 billion this year over 2023.
Streaming saturation of U.S homes means a slowing of subscription growth in future years, climbing by single digit percentages through 2027.
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Research from eMarketer includes subscription revenue from virtual pay TV providers (Sling, YouTube TV, Hulu+Live TV). But it excludes revenues from Amazon Prime.
In comparison to OTT/streaming TV subscriber revenues, OTT/streaming TV ad spending continues to see spiking double-digit percentage growth -- estimated to rise 22% this year to $30.1 billion and 72.5% by 2027 to $42.4 billion.
The rise of FAST channels (Free Ad Supported Television) as well as new growing ad-supported streaming options from Amazon Prime Video, Netflix, and Disney+ will be major contributors.
Wayne, since major player OTT/Streaming's business models are not based on ad support a fairer comparison might be to take only those that accept ads---anr/or subscription incomes----like "linear TV" versus AVOD/FASTs ---but not those that are based only on subscription revenues. That might level the playing field a tad.