• by Wayne Friedman , Staff Writer, June 11, 2025

A new study says advertising on free streaming/FAST platforms can result in the same “attention” level -- or higher -- than those airings on advertising-supported paid streaming platforms.

The study -- from Roku and Magna Media Trials, a service of the IPG media agency intelligence unit -- cites second- and third-quarter 2024 research from TVision and its panel of 16,000 TV viewers.

It defines “attention” as the percentage of advertising impressions where viewers have their eyes on the screen for two or more seconds.

Roku, the distributor of streaming apps, owns the Roku Channel, a FAST (free-advertising supporting streaming television) channel.

The research says the viewability rate -- the percentage of ads in which a viewer was “in the room” for one or more seconds -- is 75% for free streaming and 74% for ad-supported/paid streaming.

Looking deeper, it says the visual ad attention rate -- the percentage of ads getting more than two seconds of cumulative attention -- was at 50% for both free-streaming/ad-supported/paid streaming.

In addition, it says the portion of advertisements with total duration length seen by a viewer who was “actively paying attention” was 26% for free-streaming and 27% for ad-supported/paid streaming.

The research also shows that when a second advertising exposure is aired on a streaming platform -- versus a second exposure on a traditional TV network -- streaming boosts attention levels more than traditional TV.

While there is concern over the maturity of the streaming industry --- and “churn,” when subscribers cancel streaming apps -- the study says that over the past three months, 44% of respondents added a subscription service, while 36% cancelled a service and 29% "modified" a service, which could include upgrading a service.