Apple TV+ joined Prime Video, Paramount+ and Peacock in April as it launched its first foray into live esports with weekly “Friday Night Baseball” MLB double headers. With most live sports programming still found on linear TV networks, the availability of live sports on video-on-demand services with general entertainment subscriptions remains limited and is unlikely to be an important factor in attracting new subscribers. However, a significant overlap in sports interest and households watching SVOD could indicate that streaming sports is an important factor in keeping current SVOD subscribers happy and a key reason Amazon.com Inc., Comcast Corp. , Walt Disney Co., Paramount Global and other operators are making expensive programming bets on the desirability of streaming sports.
* About half of US Internet households surveyed in Kagan’s Q3’21 Consumer Insights survey said they watch football, while about a third watch baseball and basketball.
*Sports viewership falls dramatically across all sports for cable-cutter and cable-never households compared to traditional multi-channel households. Households that watch a roughly equal mix of live TV and on-demand content tend to be more avid sports viewers than households that primarily watch live TV.
* Apple TV+, HBO Max, Paramount+ and Peacock have some of the highest concentrations of sports fans among current users across many sports. Including or expanding the availability of live sports could help differentiate their offerings in a crowded market.
Kagan’s Consumer Insights survey of 2,529 US internet adults, conducted in September 2021, showed that consumer interest in esports is both deep and broad. While the majority (53%) of internet households in the US reported watching football, other major sports such as baseball (33%), basketball (31%) and hockey (17%) were also very popular. Outside of the Big Four sports, about 13% to 15% of households reported watching motorsports, golf, soccer and tennis.
Amazon’s 11-year, $11 billion deal with the NFL as the exclusive home of “Thursday Night Football” underscores the potential costs involved, even as other streaming sports deals come with more affordable pricing. Apple Inc. pays an estimated $55 million annually for the rights to its Friday Night MLB games, while Warner Bros. Discovery Inc.’s eight-year deal with US Soccer for the rights to US women’s and men’s soccer games includes an estimated total price was connected day of 200 million dollars.
Access selected survey data covered in this article in Excel format here.
The segmentation of the sports watched by traditional multichannel households, cable cutters and cable refusers underscores the fact that many sports fans still depend on pay TV to catch their favorite teams in action. 60% of multichannel households reported watching football, versus 47% of non-cable households and less than a third of non-cable households. Whether due to overall lifestyle or a relative lack of live sports streaming (or a combination thereof), cable-editing and cable-never households reported being far less likely to watch any of the live sports surveyed , than their multi-channel household counterparts.
Breaking down surveyed households by type of video entertainment viewed – live TV versus on-demand – and sports interest adds another wrinkle to the suitability of live sports and SVOD. Not surprisingly, households that primarily watch live TV watch a wide range of sports, but they are consistently outperformed in sports consumption by households that watch an equal mix of live TV and on-demand entertainment. Similar to households without cable, households that primarily watch on-demand entertainment lag significantly behind in non-martial arts sports television – likely due to the very limited linear TV broadcast of boxing and mixed martial arts competitions.
Moving to households using top SVOD services and the sports they watch, most major services already have an above-average percentage of live sports viewers compared to the total number of survey respondents. When watching the Big Four sports (soccer, baseball, basketball, and hockey), only Hulu households lagged behind the total number of respondents when it came to watching sports, while Apple TV+ consistently led the field.
Services without any live sports – such as Netflix Inc. and Disney+ – also reach a significant number of sports-watching households, in large part due to overlapping demographics of typical sports viewers and SVOD users. Multi-channel TV households (the most likely homes for sports viewers) are also typically heavy SVOD users, watching an average of 4.2 SVOD services, versus 3.7 services for households with cable cutters and 2.5 services for households without Cable.
Analysis of smaller niche sports shows similar trends, with Apple TV+, HBO Max, Paramount+ and Peacock Premium each hosting comparatively high concentrations of viewers from most sports. Paramount+ and Peacock offer the broadest range of sports programming among the major SVOD services, while HBO Max has announced plans to stream US women’s and men’s national team soccer games beginning in 2023 and expand to additional sports involving Warner Bros. Discovery holds rights.
Respondents were also asked several additional questions about sports behavior, including attending live games, purchasing season tickets and placing sports bets, and whether the availability of live sports or the ability to place bets impacted the desirability of SVOD -Services increased. Nearly a third of respondents said they attend live professional sporting events or are more likely to subscribe to an SVOD service involving sport, while other behaviors are less common. Only 13% of respondents were season ticket holders, while 17% had placed a sports bet in the last year or said they would be more likely to subscribe to an SVOD service if it offered the opportunity to bet on sports.
Research into dedicated sports fans who affirmed this behavior shows both a strong appetite for SVOD services and potential growth opportunities for services like Apple TV+, Paramount+ and Peacock Premium. Netflix is already used by around 75% to 82% of respondents who engage with the various behaviors, and Prime Video and Disney+ are also commonly used by around two-thirds and more than half of their respective respondents.
Of the three services that aren’t as widely adopted — Apple TV+, Paramount+, and Peacock Premium — Peacock might take the biggest advantage of live sports availability. Peacock Premium subscribers can access a range of live sports spanning football, soccer, golf, tennis, motorsports, wrestling and the Olympics and have benefited from NBCU’s decision to shut down NBC Sports Network and shut down some sports programming to relocate Peacock and USA Network.
For additional survey data on a variety of sports behavior and services, see the following report: US Sports Viewing Trends, Q3’21.
The data presented in this article was collected from Kagan’s Q3’21 US Consumer Insights survey conducted in September 2021. The survey enrolled a total of 2,529 Internet adults with a margin of error of +/- 1.9 percentage points at a 95% confidence level. Percentages are rounded up to the nearest whole number.
For more information on access conditions to the raw data underlying this survey, please contact [email protected]
To submit direct feedback/suggestions on the questions presented here, please use the “Feedback” button above just below the title of this article. Note that while all submissions are reviewed and every attempt is made to provide relevant data, Kagan cannot guarantee that specific questions will be included in future surveys.
Consumer Insights is a regular feature from Kagan, a group within S&P Global Market Intelligence’s TMT offering, providing exclusive research and commentary.
To submit direct feedback/suggestions on the questions presented here, please use the “Feedback” button above just below the title of this article. Note that while all submissions are reviewed and every attempt is made to provide relevant data, Kagan cannot guarantee that specific questions will be included in future surveys.
Consumer Insights is a regular feature from Kagan, a group within S&P Global Market Intelligence’s TMT offering, providing exclusive research and commentary.
This article was published by S&P Global Market Intelligence and not by S&P Global Ratings, a separately managed division of S&P Global.
