Everyone TV says that its Freely platform had a million users in the United Kingdom over the Christmas week. It last reported having half a million weekly users in September 2025, so that represents a doubling of users, albeit from a small base, but it is still only a small percentage of all viewers. It was also a period over which the public service broadcasters delivered dismal viewing figures.
“Surpassing one million weekly users is an exciting milestone for Freely, signalling that there is audience demand for a simple way to stream live British TV and discover great on demand shows — all in one place,” Jonathan Thompson, the chief executive of Everyone TV, said. “Freely was the fastest growing TV platform in 2025, showing the power of the UK’s public service broadcasters working together to make brilliant British TV easy to discover and stream.”
To put the numbers in perspective, there are just under 30 million homes in the United Kingdom, so a million represents a market penetration of around 3-4% in the 18 months since Freely launched in May 2024.
Everyone TV reports that the hybrid broadcast and broadband television platform, backed by the BBC, ITV, Channel 4, and Channel 5, saw strong daily engagement over the festive period, with 55% of its one million weekly users returning every day to stream programmes, with two-thirds of its users only using online services.
With a million active users, Freely could only have delivered a minority of television viewing across the country over Christmas, which saw audiences fall to an all-time low.
Consolidated seven-day viewing figures from Barb now show that the most viewed programme over Christmas within seven days of transmission was Amandaland, with 7.07 million viewers. That was followed by The Scarecrow’s Wedding, with 6.67 million, and the annual speech by The King, with 6.42 million across all channels.
Interestingly, the Amandaland Christmas Special only had 3.1 million viewers on Christmas Day in the overnight figures published by the BBC, but Barb reports it as Series 2025 in its consolidated numbers.
The Scarecrows’ Wedding animated adaptation of a children’s book had an estimated 4.3 million viewers on Christmas Day, but added another 2.37 million from recorded playback and on-demand viewing over the next six days.
The drama series Call the Midwife had a 7-day consolidated audience of 6.13 million, of which 3.44 million watched on Christmas Day. That was down from 7.78 million over 7 days the previous Christmas.
Episodes 5 and 6 of series 5 of Stranger Things on Netflix ranked 8 and 9 for the Christmas week, with 5.43 million and 5.23 million viewers respectively.
Irrespective of Freely, Christmas viewing figures now include a substantial proportion of viewing that is not at the time of transmission, with viewers less likely to be watching the same thing at the same time.
Nevertheless, many viewers do choose to watch programmes that are current, whether they come from broadcasters or online video subscription services. However, the relatively low numbers for particular programmes compared to historic figures suggest that a lot of other viewing may be spread across the vast range of alternative options now available.