US sports viewers migrate online

More and more US sports fans are watching via online channels, according to research which estimates that 50 million online viewers now have access to a game of the week from various US sports. 

Context

While traditional regional sports networks on cable and satellite have been struggling, research firm Antenna notes that online services reaching large parts of the population – such as ESPN+ or MLB TV – are generally doing better. Antenna also reports that more people are now signed up to YouTube’s Sunday Ticket NFL games than subscribed to the previous NFL distributor, DirecTV.

Takeaways 

• The NFL Sunday Ticket, distributed by YouTube, has attracted an estimated 1.3 million sign-ups, Bloomberg reports.
• Thursday Night Football, streamed by Amazon, is averaging 13.5 million viewers a game.
• Four in ten Sunday Ticket subscribers, who purchased the package as an add-on to their YouTubeTV subscription, are new YouTube TV subscribers.
• The NFL+ service, which launched in July last year, has 2 million subscribers, while services run by sports leagues are approaching 10 million customers.

Why streaming sport matters

“It’s a really great win-win for the NFL and YouTube,” said Jonathan Carson, co-founder and chief executive officer at Antenna. Not so great for broadcast networks, however, as they lose their grip on the one thing that guarantees viewers and advertisers. 

Sourced from Bloomberg