Nolte: For First Time, More People Stream than Watch Cable/Broadcast TV

For the first time ever, more people streamed on their TV than watched cable and broadcast television combined.

In the month of May, 20.1 percent of TV viewing was via broadcast or over-the-air TV, and 24.1 percent of TV viewing was via cable TV. That comes to a total of 44.1 percent.

During that same month, 44.8 percent of TV viewing was via streaming.

That’s a first.

The most important point is that this is TV viewing. Nielsen is not measuring all the video consumed on computers, tablets, or phones. This is a measurement of how Americans currently watch television.

Over the last four years, per Nielsen, streaming viewership has jumped an incredible 71 percent.

Most of this TV streaming is via YouTube, which accounts for 12.5 percent of all TV — a viewing jump of 120 percent since 2021.

Then comes Netflix (7.5 percent), the Disney Grooming Syndicate (5.0 percent), Prime Video/Amazon (3.5 percent), the Roku Channel (2.5 percent), Paramount+ /Pluto TV (2.2 percent), Tubi (2.2 percent), Warner Bros Discovery (1.5 percent), and Peacock (1.4 percent). “Other streaming outlets” came in third place behind YouTube and Netflix with a sum total of 6.5 percent.

So what does this mean?

The best news is that the left-wing affirmative action program known as cable TV is dying, and this is why you are seeing the stock prices of these major entertainment companies collapsing. It used to be that 100 million households paid a fortune for the five cable channels they wanted and 105 they didn’t (this includes satellite companies like DirecTV). Nevertheless, you still paid for those 105 channels, and those carriage fees kept unpopular channels (MTV, CNNLOL, Comedy Central) flush with cash even though no one watched them.

Today, only about 55 million households are still dumb enough to subscribe to cable. That number will continue to drop as people become more comfortable with streaming and older viewers who refuse to switch die off. That kills the affirmative action distribution of those carriage fees, which will doom those leftist channels forever.

Streaming has its issues, but it is merit-based. If you want it, you pay for it. Cable is a total racket.

The other good news is the percentage of those streaming all the free product out there. YouTube’s subscription streaming service went nowhere, so let’s assume most of that 12.5 percent is people watching YouTube’s free content. Pluto TV is free. The Roku Channel is free. Tubi is free. Between broadcast TV (which is free) and free streaming, about 40 percent of TV viewing is not attached to any kind of fee.

That, I think, is the future. Netflix will always be out there. They have captured the market and have done a bang-up job holding onto it with new content every week aimed at everyone.

Except for Amazon Prime and its limitless pile of money coming from its other services, the other streaming outlets are losing billions or barely breaking even, and that simply isn’t sustainable. Rather than holding on to their loser streaming outlets, look for them to first try merging and then giving up entirely on streaming to go back to a production-only service that feeds content to Netflix and all the free streaming outlets, making money via advertising.

Wow. Free TV sustained by merit-based advertising fees based on popularity. What a concept. Next thing you know, water will be free again.

John Nolte’s first and last novel, Borrowed Time, is winning five-star raves from everyday readers. You can read an excerpt here and an in-depth review here. Also available in hardcover and on Kindle and Audiobook.