Commentary
Streaming Co-Viewing Strength: Sports, Premium Programs
- by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, January 29, 2025
Highly scrutinized co-viewing data continues to be important measure in the modern digital video world -- especially with sports and also one-time major events.
In November, Netflix’s “Tyson vs. Paul” boxing event posted viewing levels near to the Super Bowl toward the end of the match -- where there was on average two viewers per viewing household, according to TVision.
Research showed that the airing of the program from 8 p.m. to 12 a.m. -- which included preliminary matches -- had increasing co-viewing, from a 1.78 to a 1.94.
Over the same period, broader streaming co-viewing for all on-demand OTT programming was higher than linear TV -- at a constant 1.66 average.
By comparison, linear TV posted a 1.38 average, while the "Tyson vs. Paul" event averaged 1.87.
TVision data estimates that 108 million U.S. viewers watched the boxing program, and says that by the final hour, more than half the entire TV viewing audience watched the fight.
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Analyst cite continued value in observing co-viewing because it can produce real-time engagement and communication among those in the room -- especially when there are children present. This can change typical TV “passive” viewing to more “active” consumption -- something that benefits TV content producers and advertisers.
TVision -- which measures attention through eyes-on-the-screen technology -- says viewing in households with kids, where there is co-viewing of premium TV content, results in higher attention.
In particular, content on Disney+ where there is co-viewing with kids shows 4% more attention than other apps.
Looking at all co-viewing -- regardless of age and gender -- Disney+ scores the most viewers per viewing household, with a 1.7.
Prime Video and Hulu are next -- each with a 1.5 -- followed by Paramount+, Tubi and Netflix, each with a 1.4 for attention.
Wayne Friedman is West Coast Editor of MediaPost. You can reach Wayne at wayne@mediapost.com.
As an audience measurement lifer, I'd note that the key thing about measurement of co-viewing (as opposed to the phenomenon of co-viewing) isn't so much the inrtra-room dynamic among viewers, so much as counting all the impressions. In the streaming world, streams may be empirically counted, and mapped to precise accounts and/or devices associated with these streams. But what co-viewing enables you to get at is, if I put one piece of creative on one piece of glass, is that one impression, or three? I am sure that Netflix, and all the other streamers who sell ads, want to assure that they get credit for all the viewers out there on the receiving end of the streams.
Josh, if TVision says that the average Super Bowl commercial scored 20% above the norm in ad attentiveness that means that approximately 65% of the program viewers had their eyes on-screen for at least two seconds when an average commercial appeared as the norm for all of "TV" ----per its revised definition of program viewing--- is about 55%. If the same source--or Nielsen----says that 125 million people aged 2+ watched the game just before a typical ad break, then you merely multiply the 125 million figure by 65% and you get 81 million commercial viewers. This applies to all of the viewers measured---co-viewing or otherwise.
Ed, I haven't said a thing about attentiveness or eyes-on or commercial versus program audience. I'm merely saying that in my experience, most of the concerns about co-viewing aren't about the relative merits of solo viewing versus co-viewing, but rather about accurately counting everyone in the room.
I never said you did, Josh. And you are perfectly right ---about the need to count everybody who watched.
The problem with purely digital exposures---mobile, in particular, including social media, is that much of it takes place out of home--hence is difficult to measure in terms of how many and what kinds of people were involved.
So, for the time being, we are stuck with meter findings which only tell us that a device was activated and that ad content was on-screen. Indeed it seems that such "counts" may also include times when a digital device is turned off and, in all cases, times when no one is present.
It's an imperfect world, but fortunately, 90% or more of the viewing of"premium" TV content takes place at home on TV sets, so we've got to be patient until some one figures out how the measure all of the audience no matter how it is attained.