TV viewership plunges from 52 per cent to 23 per cent as smartphones, PCs takeover: Survey

A survey has revealed that there has been a significant dip in the number of consumers watching shows on TV to 23 per cent from 52 per cent over the past year as they prefer to view it on laptops and smartphones.

“Consumers increasingly prefer to watch TV shows on devices such as laptop and desktop personal computers and smartphones,” according to an online survey of 26,000 consumers across 26 countries, conducted by Accenture.

“More than 4 in 10 consumers (42 per cent) said they would rather view TV shows on a laptop or desktop, up from 32 per cent in the last year’s survey,” as per the report.

Nearly 13 per cent said they prefer watching TV shows on their smartphones, compared to 10 per cent last year. “The decline in TV viewing over the past year tracks with a four-year trend. As recently as 2014, the survey revealed that nearly two-thirds (65 per cent) of consumers preferred the TV set for viewing shows,” it said.

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The most recent findings show that only one in five consumers (19 per cent) now prefer to watch sports games on their TVs, down from 38 per cent in the prior-year survey.

The report indicates a steep decline over the past year in the percentage of consumers from India who prefer to watch shows on TV sets. That number dropped 78 per cent, from 47 per cent to 10 per cent.

In the US, the number fell 57 per cent (from 59 per cent to 25 per cent), and in the UK it dropped 55 per cent (from 56 per cent to 25 per cent), the survey said.

“Over the past one year we have seen a surge in the launch of over-the-top services, both by global and Indian media, and entertainment companies,” Accenture India Managing Director Aditya Chaudhuri said.

“The ever increasing penetration of the internet mainly through mobile, backed by WiFi and broadband has helped this wave,” he said. Chaudhuri said along with the internet penetration, high-quality content has enticed the Indian consumers to view varied content, both live broadcast and video-on-demand (VOD), on different devices.

“While the consumers increasingly prefer to watch TV shows on laptops and desktops, the smartphone is becoming the preferred device for watching short video clips,” he said.

In the survey, more than one-third of consumers said they would rather view these clips on their mobile handsets, a substantial increase from 28 per cent last year.

In contrast, the number of consumers who said they would rather watch video clips on their laptops and desktops dropped slightly, from 47 per cent to 44 percent over the last year.The number of consumers who said they prefer to view these clips on their TV sets dropped even more, from 16 per cent to only 5 per cent, the survey added.

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