At the start of 2020, consumers in the United States subscribed to an average of three paid streaming services, but after months of government-mandated lockdowns, the number has increased to five.
In a recent survey of over 5,000 active online subscribers in the United States and Canada, 81% of respondents wished that paid streaming services like Netflix or Amazon Prime Video offered a free, ad-supported option.
In 2020, Netflix gained 37 million subscribers worldwide, breaking its 2018 record of 28 million new additions. Currently, Netflix has 204 million active subscribers.
As a result of diminishing content availability precipitated by production delays and cancellations, there will be large programming gaps for traditional television networks and OTT platforms to fill over the next two years.
Forced stay-at-home orders propelled Netflix’s fastest subscriber additions in its twenty-three history. The streaming leader added 26 million subscribers in the first half of 2020, making it one of the biggest lockdown economy winners.
SVOD is still a minor segment of the overall streaming market in Germany. Proportionally, Germany spends less than half of US households ($24 billion) on SVOD services when adjusted for currency and population.
The growth of SVOD services in Scandinavia shows no signs of slowing down. Despite heavy competition from local services Netflix has gained four million subscribers.
Since the COVID lockdown began, nearly five million UK households have signed up for a streaming service. Netflix, Amazon, and Disney+ have been the primary beneficiaries of this boom.
COVID-19 has decimated global content pipelines by halting film production, canceling greenlit projects, and closing cinemas. However, the present disruptions have only accelerated transformations that were well underway.
With most of the world in mandatory lockdown, Netflix doubled its quarterly subscriber estimates from January through March by adding 16 million new subscribers.
As the coronavirus and subsequent global shutdown forces film and television production into an unprecedented standstill, streaming services are accelerating their takeover.
The major studios sabotaged the dream of a la carte programming and are now attempting to transform streaming into cable television via an ethernet connection instead of coaxial.
AVOD is gaining ground on SVOD in the United States. The proportion of television viewership that is through streaming services has almost doubled since 2018.
Streaming giant Netflix officially opened its latest non-US office in Paris last month, signaling a deeper commitment to Europe. Netflix now has four offices in Europe.
In the fourth quarter, two million US subscribers cut the cord on traditional television packages from AT&T, Comcast, Charter, and Verizon, up from 1.7 million in the third quarter.
Disney+ nearly triples its subscriber base since launching in November. Through January, the streaming service has 28.6 million subscribers, up from 10 million weeks after it debuted.
Deal activity is muted so far at this year’s festival despite claims that producers and sales agents were withholding their best films at TIFF in September to introduce at Sundance.