• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, October 16, 2024

Although entertainment consumers still rate ad-free subscription video platforms as having “very good quality” when it comes to TV and movie content, the results have dropped slightly versus a year ago, according to a TiVo survey.

Ad-free subscription video-on-demand platforms -- Netflix, Prime Video, Hulu and others -- still command top results among consumers, with a 74.5% score.

However, this is down from 77.4% in the same period a year ago, and lower than the percentage of 78.6% in 2022.

Results are also down on other platforms: Pay TV at 65.1% (down from 69.1% in 2023), with ad-supported SVOD at 60.8% (74.2%), virtual pay TV services at 66.7% (75.1%), free AVOD at 53.1% (60.4%) and TV network apps at 56.2% (63.3%).

The survey also says consumers are narrowing their total number of video services -- down to 9.1 (from 10.9 a year ago, and 9.9 in 2022).

Paid services are now at 5.7 (from 6.7 in 2022). But “non-paid” services have inched up to 3.4 (from 3.2 in 2022).

The survey estimates total overall spending on video services is down $30 year-over-year to an average $140.06 -- with pay TV subscriptions at $178.06 (from $211.92 in 2022) and broadband subscriptions at $65.16 (up from $62.30 in 2022).

Discovery issues continue when it comes to finding TV and movie content: 

-- 84.5% spend time browsing content before landing a TV show or movie -- up from 82% a year before
-- Just 15.5% know exactly what they want to watch before sitting down to watch TV -- down from 17.8% a year ago
-- 48% say it is “annoying” to look at multiple streaming platforms before finding something to watch

This result is at the same level as a year ago.

TiVo’s survey was conducted in the second quarter of this year among 4,490 respondents ages 18 years and up.