Subscription TV suffers as free to stream sees growth in 2022
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Editor
| 28 October 2022
In what the TV advertising provider says is an ongoing indication of the evolving way in which audiences are accessing content, Samsung Ads releases study finding that as the cost of living rises across the world, and free streamed television offerings improve, the appeal of free ad-supported content is growing.
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The findings come from Samsung Ads’ latest report, Behind the Screens: Decoding the Streaming Landscape, looking at Samsung Smart TV data from five EU countries: UK, Italy, Spain, France, and Germany (EU5). The report is built from Samsung Ads’ first party ACR data from its millions of Samsung Smart TVs in the region, offering insight into the habits of the modern TV viewer.

The study found ad-supported video on demand (AVOD) services’ share of streaming hours per TV screen has increased 5% since the beginning of the year. In the same period, audience time viewing subscription based video on demand (SVOD) decreased by 5%. This suggests that streaming audiences are migrating from SVOD to AVOD platforms. As such said Samsung Ads streaming services - not least Netflix and Disney+ - are beginning to recognise the value that ad-supported formats can drive for their business models as customers look to cut costs but want to maintain choice in their TV ecosystem.

Among streaming types in the UK, SVOD and AVOD were leading the charge in reach. When looking at the percentage of Samsung Smart TVs that viewed each type of streaming in H1 2022, 80% of TVs in the UK streamed on SVOD services and 76% streamed on AVOD. The growing appetite for free content in exchange for ads is producing new sub genres of the format. Free ad supported TV (FAST), which combines both linear and VOD experience in one place, is a rapidly growing subset of the content form.

“Excitingly, the streaming landscape is going through another period of great change, AVOD’s growth continues as more audiences take up streaming, at the same time as the cost of living has tightened budgets,” said Samsung Ads vice president of Europe Alex Hole commenting on the findings.

“Streaming habits picked up during lockdowns have for the most part stuck, resulting in a growing arena for publishers and advertisers to reach audiences in the TV ecosystem. These streaming audiences are tech-savvy consumers, using their TVs in new ways, and they’re an important cohort to reach and better understand. With Netflix and Disney+ set to introduce ad-tier options to their platforms in the near future, the lines are being blurred between VOD types - and this provides even more opportunities for advertisers to engage with the ever-growing subset of streaming TV watchers.”