YouTube Extends Streaming Lead With 14% of TV Viewership in July

YouTube has extended its lead in streaming with a record 14.2% share of TV viewership in July, a 6% month-over-month increase, according to Nielsen’s latest Gauge report.

The platform’s momentum comes as the streaming category’s overall share climbed to 49% of TV viewership, an increase of 3.4% that was boosted by the final weeks of the FIFA World Cup.

In comparison, broadcast and cable finished the month with shares of 19.5% and 18.7%, respectively. The former, which normally sees a 4% to 5% usage decrease in July, instead saw an increase of 1% driven by the World Cup. However, cable usage was down 2% on a monthly basis, which was primarily driven by a 27% decline in sports viewing as the number of World Cup fell. Sports viewing represented 6% of all cable viewership.

Overall, total TV usage grew 2.2% between June and July, relatively flat compared to the 2.3% increase in the prior year period.

When looking by distributor, NBCUniversal and Versant trailed behind YouTube with a combined 9.2% share. NBCU accounted for 7.1% of that total, while Versant made up the remaining 2.1%.

Peacock saw a double-digit viewership increase of 15% driven by “Love Island USA” and the World Cup, bring the service’s total share of streaming viewership to 2.6%. “Love Island USA” generated 4.9 billion viewing minutes in July and 11.7 billion minutes across June and July combined. The World Cup’s July 5 match between Mexico and England and July 19 match between Spain and Argentina also resulted in the streamer’s two most-viewed days during the period.

Meanwhile, Disney fell to the third place spot with 8.9% of TV viewership. Its share of streaming rose to 4.7%, an increase of 4% compared to June, with gains across all key demographic groups, including a 7% lift among 6-17 year-olds. Contributing to Disney’s gain for the month was “The Bear” and “King of the Hill,” which generated nearly 3 billion viewing minutes combined.

Though Netflix remained the second-largest streamer by viewership, it finished the month as the fourth largest distributor with a share of 7.8% — tying with Fox, which saw the largest monthly viewing increase among media distributors for a second consecutive month.

The Murdoch-owned media giant saw a 36% viewership bump driven by its World Cup coverage on top of a 73% increase its broadcast affiliates exhibited in June. It also had 25 of the top 26 July telecasts, including the record-breaking World Cup Final on July 19. Tubi finished the month with a share of 2%.

Rounding out the rest of the list was Paramount with a 6.5% viewership share, including 2.2% from Paramount+ and Pluto TV; Warner Bros. Discovery with a 5.3% share, including 1.4% from it streaming services; Amazon with a 4.3% share; The Roku Channel with a 2.9% share; Scripps with a 1.5% share, Weigel Broadcasting with a 1.4% share, A+E Networks and Hallmark with shares of 0.8% each and AMC Networks with a 0.6% share.

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