LONDON: TV accounted for 93.8% of video ads that were viewed in the UK in 2016, or the equivalent of 18 minutes and 53 seconds a day, the latest industry figures have revealed.

According to Thinkbox, the marketing body for commercial TV in the UK, that was slightly down on TV's share of 94.4% in 2015, although it was still far more than other forms of video advertising.

YouTube, for example, accounted for 0.7% of viewed video ads in 2016, up from 0.5% in 2015, while other online video, including Facebook, collectively accounted for 5.2%, up from 4.7% in 2015. Meanwhile, cinema accounted for 0.4% of ad views.

Overall, the average person in the UK watched 20 minutes of video ads a day in 2016 while total video consumption increased year-on-year from an average of 4 hours, 35 minutes a day in 2015 to 4 hours, 37 minutes in 2016.

TV accounted for 74.8% of all video viewing in the UK last year, down from 76% in 2015. That included live TV (60% of total video viewing, down from 61.6% in 2015), playback TV (10.8%, down from 11.4%) and video-on-demand (3.9%, up from 3%).

Looking at online sites in more detail, Thinkbox also revealed that YouTube attracted more video eyeballs in 2016 than Facebook.

According to the findings, YouTube accounted for 6.4% of average video viewing last year, up from 4.4% in 2015, while Facebook stood at 1.7%, down from 2.2% in 2015.

The trend appeared to be even more pronounced among younger viewers aged 16 to 24. Thinkbox said YouTube accounted for 15.6% of their video viewing in 2016, up from 10.3% in 2015, while Facebook's proportion of video viewing among 16 to 24-year-olds dropped from 5.7% in 2015 to 2.5% in 2016.

These and the other findings were based on combined 2016 data from The Broadcasters' Audience Research Board (BARB), comScore, the IPA's Touchpoints 2016 study, Ofcom's 2016 Digital Day study and Rentrak box office data.

"The available data clearly shows that TV is the pre-eminent form of video. However, scale is only one part of the story," said Lindsey Clay, CEO of Thinkbox.

"An analysis like this can't include things like relative quality and trust, the amount of premium content different video have to offer and, ultimately advertising effectiveness. In these areas too TV stands out."

Data sourced from Thinkbox; additional content by Warc staff