Nearly four out of ten users of YouTube around the world are now watching traditional television and movie programming through the platform. Documentaries are among the top five most watched genres, viewed by a quarter of YouTube users in a month. Long-form viewing on YouTube is increasingly on the living room screen.
Research by Ampere Analysis, based on global monthly active users of YouTube, suggests that 38% watch traditional television and movie programming through the platform.
24% report watching documentaries, slightly more than the 23% that say they watch films or television shows.
The audience for documentaries appears to be distinct from other types of television programming. Of those that watched documentaries or other television and movie programming, 41% watched only documentaries.
The most watched genre is music or music videos, at 56%, followed by comedy at 39% and how-to instructional videos at 29%.
Television programming ranks higher than vlogs, travel, gaming, or reviews, which were reported by around a fifth of respondents.
Those numbers represent watching any of those genres on YouTube over a month, rather than actual viewing time.
However, long-form programming, like television programmes, keeps people watching for longer and increases the overall share of YouTube across all television viewing.
Viewing of television programming skews slightly towards those aged 35-44 and to family households, although it is popular across all age groups. It is notably higher in the Asia Pacific region, where 45% of monthly active users have watch such programmes on YouTube. In Latin America it is 40%, while in North America it is 37%, but in Western Europe it is 28%.
According to the internet survey, 84% of internet users report watching YouTube monthly, with 73% saying they watching it weekly and a surprising 59% saying they do so daily.
As the report says, there is some debate about whether YouTube counts as television, but if it is viewed on a television many people will think of it as television.
Over a third of those that watched both documentaries and television shows or movies on YouTube did so on a smart television for at least some of their viewing, although smartphones and computers remain the most popular screens overall for viewing YouTube among this cohort, at 77% and 37% respectively.
Daniel Monaghan of Ampere Analysis notes that YouTube has come a long way since its early days of short, low-quality, user-generated pranks, memes, and vlogs. “We expect engagement to grow, especially as YouTube continues to establish itself more firmly in the viewer’s living room on smart TVs.”
Broadcasters and studios are increasingly releasing more full-length show and movies on YouTube. That risks cannibalising some owned-and-operated audiences, but the sheer scale and reach of YouTube means that the benefits of extending the addressable audience cannot be ignored.
Whether it is strategically wise for broadcasters to hand over their programming to Google, even sacrificially, is another matter.
The Ampere research is based on an internet survey of users aged 18-64, conducted in February and March 2025. Data on YouTube usage was collected across 29 markets globally, from 54,000 respondents.