While fewer than half of the respondents said viewership of streaming services had gone up, 34% reported they're watching between one to nine incremental hours per week of streaming services. Only a part of the country was in isolation when this survey was fielded and many service industry jobs continue to move forward with work-from-home technology. Also, when kids are home, and this is making an impact on consumption, many of them are in remote school (aka Zoom) for a good chunk of the day.
Recognizing the geographic spread of COVID-19, we see a slightly higher – and therefore predictive -- bump in streaming usage in the Northeast versus the rest of the country, especially in the incremental 5-9 hours per week range.
There is no question that the change in children's schedules is impacting TV viewing and streaming in U.S. Households.
Our data shows that in a household where there are kids present, there is a greater increase in streaming video service viewership than the increase in broadcast TV and cable; especially in the 10-19 incremental hours a week bucket where 9% of households with kids fall versus 5% of TV viewing. These households are also demonstrating an increase in traditional television viewership, just not to the same extent that streaming video has grown.