Ofcom: Changing audiences putting DTT under threat
MAY 9, 2024 11.40 EUROPE/LONDON BY JULIAN CLOVER

Broadcasters say they can now foresee a tipping point where it is no longer economically viable to support DTT in its current form.

The revelation comes in a report produced by Ofcom at the request of the Department for Culture, Media and Sport.

Taking into account earlier calls for evidence, research into audience behaviours and analysis of commercial dynamics, the regulator concludes that people are spending less and less time watching TV broadcast over DTT. The changing audience habits could take terrestrial transmissions to a point where investment in the DTT platform could not be sustained.

TV is increasingly being viewed online, driven by the mass take-up of broadband, a range of different devices, new platforms and ways to consume content. The average person spent 25% fewer minutes per day watching broadcast TV in 2023 than in 2018.

The trend is expected to continue, with watching on scheduled TV channels through Digital Terrestrial Television and satellite forecast to drop from 67% of total long-form TV viewing in 2022, to 35% by 2034 and 27% by 2040.

“If those organisations that sustain the DTT ecosystem see a weaker case for new investment, they are likely to seek to cut costs. This could mean, for example, removing HD from Freeview, or reducing the number of channels the platform can broadcast – but without support for those viewers who rely on DTT to access those services over the internet,” said Ofcom.

There is widespread support across the sector for TV services to continue to be made available to all, particularly among public service broadcasters, but no overall consensus on how this might be achieved.

Ofcom has put forward three possible scenarios:

1. Investment in a more efficient DTT service – a more efficient, but full DTT service could be an option if audience scale and investment could be sustained over the 2030s. This option may well include supporting audiences with new equipment for more efficient broadcast signals.

2. Reducing DTT to a core service – the DTT platform could retain a minimum number of core channels – for example the main public service and news channels. This would mean viewers mainly using the internet to access TV services, while also maintaining infrastructure that could deliver radio or TV, including if there are internet outages. It could be done as a temporary transition to a fuller switch off or remain indefinitely as a provider of last resort.

3. Move towards DTT switch-off in the longer term – a planned campaign to ensure people are confident and connected with internet services, so DTT could be switched off. It would take careful planning to ensure universality of public service media, with support for people so that no-one is left behind. This could have wider benefits for digital inclusion in other areas of society.

Source: Ofcom

Ofcom says an inclusive transition would take between 8 and 10 years, meaning that any decision would need to be made shortly, to allow industry to be ready for any changes by the early 2030s.