The online video service Tubi, owned by Fox Corporation, took a 1% share of television usage in the United States for the first time. The Nielsen Gauge, recalibrated to attribute multichannel online viewing to the broadcast and cable categories, showed that online services contributed 34.3% of television usage, led by YouTube.
Total usage of television in February dropped by 5.1% on the previous month, which reflects normal seasonal trends, although it was up 0.5% compared to the previous year. Usage of cable and broadcast channels was down 0.2 and 1.1 share points respectively on the previous month, down 5.1 and 2.2 share points over the year, although taken together they still accounted for over half of all viewing at 54%. Viewing of online services was down by 0.9% but gained a 1.5% share of viewing at 34.3%, with other television use at 11.7%.
YouTube, excluding YouTube TV, accounted for 7.9% of television viewing, leading Netflix with 7.3%, Hulu with 3.3%, and Amazon Prime Video with 3.0%.
Tubi TV became the latest service to achieve a 1% share of television usage, ahead of Pluto TV with 0.7%. Tubi claims it has 64 million monthly active users across the United States, Canada and Australia.
Nielsen adjusted the methodology for its Gauge. Viewing of channels through apps such as YouTube TV or Charter Spectrum app was previously included in streaming as well as cable or broadcast.
The attribution of online viewing is reduced as a result, from 39.6% to 34.3%, or 5.3% share points.
Brian Fuhrer of Nielsen described this as an “important enhancement to the Gauge to it better represents what people are watching”.
However, it further confuses the definition of online viewing, by attributing viewing of channels on YouTube TV and Hulu Live TV to the broadcast and cable categories, although they are clearly delivered online. Then again, satellite viewing is also attributed to these categories.