Nielsen: Streaming Hits Record Highs In June, Led By ‘Bridgerton’; Linear TV In Need Of Revival From Olympics & Politics

Streaming viewership accounted for a record 40.3% of TV usage in June, according to Nielsen’s latest edition of The Gauge, beating the previous single category record previously set by cable. It’s the highest share of TV that The Gauge has ever reported.

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Nielsen reports that four streaming services grew their usage by double-digits in June — Disney+ (+14.8%), Tubi (+14.7%), Netflix (+11.8%) and Max (+11.0%).

Summer usually sees a rise in streaming, especially for younger audiences, which is what seems to be happening once again. The four services mentioned above can attribute 20% or more of their growth to young audiences, likely, as Nielsen pointed out, because of additional free time for kids and teens due to the end of the school year.

Thanks to this uptick in streaming, which increased by 6% compared to May, TV usage overall also jumped 2.1% compared to the month prior.

The platform that deserves the most spotlight is undoubtedly Tubi, which accounted 2% of streaming usage. That is on par with Disney+ and more than Max, Paramount+ and Peacock. It also beats Tubi’s FAST competitors, Pluto TV and the Roku Channel.

FAST platform usage has been on the rise in recent months, with their collective streaming usage rivaling that of the premium subscription services.

Also in streaming, Netflix jumped to 8.4% of total TV, which is just shy of a record for the platform. This should be no surprise, considering that the streamer capitalized on Bridgerton ‘s 9.3B viewing minutes to make that happen. Netflix also found success with Showtime’s Your Honor , which got a new lease on life when it landed on the streamer, tacking up 7.5B minutes viewed across Netflix and its original streaming home, Paramount+.

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Other titles that performed well on streaming in June included Prime Video’s The Boys with 4B viewing minutes, and House of the Dragon , which totaled 3.4B minutes on Max (not including linear viewership).

Meanwhile, traditional linear TV took a bit of a hit in June. The broadcast category lost 1.8 share points and cable fell by 1.0 point, bringing the two to a combined 47.7% of overall TV this month. This is fairly typical for the summer months, given a lack of both scripted television and sports. Especially sports.

Broadcast and cable viewership will likely increase in July and August, thanks to the Summer Olympics. With unprecedented interest already building during the U.S. Olympic trials, NBC is definitely banking on the Summer Games to revive the network leading into the fall season. Nielsen reports that NBC’s Sunday night broadcast of the women’s gymnastics Olympic Trials was eighth among the month’s top telecasts with 7.4M viewers, hinting at a strong year for the Olympics — which is much needed after the Tokyo Olympics dropped dramatically from years past.

Other networks will also tee up their own Olympics analysis and programming in hopes of generating more viewership.

Cable is also probably going to see a boost in the next several months as the presidential election draws near. The cable news networks saw big viewership for the CNN Presidential Debate, with the home network generating the largest audience at 10M viewers. That was followed by Fox News Channel with 9.5M.

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