In our last educational article titled ‘TV Acronyms and Initialisms’, we attempted to clarify some of the terminology and industry jargon that fills the media industry. And by doing so, we addressed the VOD space, gauging an understanding of the different types of video-on-demand. And this is beneficial because, by increasing awareness of this, one can begin to learn more than just the complexities that accompany definitions but can delve into the intricacies that come with each type of viewing.

Research around device viewing has been coming out every year, with the likes of ThinkBox releasing a presentation on ‘Beyond the TV set: device viewing [1] ‘ and the Broadcaster’s Audience Research Board releasing their annual exploration of the UK’s viewing habits. The expansion of TV beyond the living room is obvious, but what is also clear is the impact of both programme and genre on device viewing behaviour.

SVOD and Drama

https://www.digitalspy.com/tv/a832987/happy-valley-season-series-3-cast-start-date-filming-bbc-air-date-release

Figures show that the Drama genre very much aligns with the use of subscription-video-on-demand, and this is a significant part of the growth in SVOD as Drama titles tend to dominate the list of top television shows, such as recent releases, Happy Valley series 3, Black Bird, and comedy-drama series The White Lotus. Rachel Shaw, Head of Portfolio for the BBC, acknowledged the rise of Drama and its inevitable link to SVOD in the Viewing Report, stating that ‘Drama ticks a number of boxes for SVOD services. It’s a great acquisition tool, driving subscription revenue and bringing people to trial the service for the first time [2] ‘.

Due to the popularity surrounding Drama programmes, it is unsurprising that Drama is more likely to be watched through time-shifted viewing (time-shifted viewing being any non-live viewing to programmes that takes place within 164 hours (approx7 days) of the original broadcast is reported as time-shifted viewing [3]). Primetime Drama has high levels of time-shifted viewing because many do not want to be disturbed as it is often a lot of people’s most precious type of programme.

Linear TV and Sport

Linear TV viewing has been declining for a while now, as for many people, Broadcaster video-on-demand has replaced the traditional system. ThinkBox recently explained this switch, explaining that ‘of all BVOD, 77% is watched on the TV set although some viewing takes place on all devices’ and ‘83.4% of homes have a TV connected to the internet, so access to BVOD is pretty universal’.

However, this swap to BVOD from Linear is not necessarily the case with sports programmes. Many still tend to watch sports live, and it has a high-levels of live viewing because it is time-sensitive. For example, looking at the UEFA European Championship England v Denmark, ITV, 7th July 2021, there were 18.41 million total viewers, and 16.42 million were live TV set viewing, 1.19 million were VOSDAL (viewed on the same day as live viewing [4] ).

However, complexities remain as some sports are not always at a suitable time, thus leaving people using on-demand to catch up when the time is right. For example, ‘PC viewing, in particular, was high during the Rugby World Cup, perhaps unsurprising given that quite a few games were live during weekday business hours [5] ‘.

Reality TV

As noted back in 2020, ‘the reality format, for so long a staple of Linear TV channels, is beginning to take a hold on subscription video on demand platforms’, and this is most definitely the case now three years later. Love Island last year took the number 1 spot for ‘the biggest series in UK broadcaster streaming, with more than 273 million streams last summer… with its most popular episode picking up a total of 8.9 million streams [6] ‘.

And this level of viewing success is not just Love Island only, with Discovery+ including a wide range of different reality shows as the audience continues expanding; this includes shows such as Temptation Island, Written in the Stars, and 90 Day Fiancé.

Reality TV has ‘become a mainstay of modern entertainment in homes all around the globe’, making it an all-round success on most devices. BARB explained that ‘Love Island achieved by far the biggest smartphone audience in this top-ranked table, with smartphone viewing comprising 11% of that episode’s total four-screen audience or 41% of the non-TV device viewing. Other Love Island episodes drove the highest absolute levels of PC and tablet viewing’, thus proving how reality TV has undeniably expanded from [7]  traditional viewing.

Resources:

[1] https://www.thinkbox.tv/research/nickable-charts/advanced-tv/beyond-the-tv-set-device-viewing/#download

[2] https://www.barb.co.uk/download/?file=/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Barb-Viewing-Report-2020_32pp_spreads_FINAL.pdf

[3] https://www.barb.co.uk/news/time-shift-viewing/

[4] https://www.thinkbox.tv/how-to-use-tv/broadcaster-vod/introduction-to-bvod/

[5] https://www.barb.co.uk/download/?file=/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Barb-Viewing-Report-2020_32pp_spreads_FINAL.pdf

[6] https://www.dailymail.co.uk/tvshowbiz/article-11697311/Love-Island-named-watched-ITV-2022-273-MILLION-streams.html

[7] https://www.barb.co.uk/download/?file=/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/Barb-Viewing-Report-2020_32pp_spreads_FINAL.pdf