Streaming smashes TV records as viewing hits new highs in December: Nielsen report

NEW YORK: Streaming tightened its grip on television in December 2025, capturing a record 47.5 per cent of total TV viewing and eclipsing the previous high set just five months earlier, according to Nielsen’s The Gauge.

The milestone month was powered by a historic Christmas Day surge, when streaming clocked 55.1 billion viewing minutes, the highest single-day total ever recorded. That figure smashed the previous record of 51.2 billion minutes set on December 25, 2024, and marked only the second time daily streaming consumption has crossed the 50-billion-minute threshold.

The spike was driven by back-to-back NFL games on Netflix, followed by the release of new episodes of Stranger Things, and capped by Prime Video’s late NFL fixture. Together, Netflix and Prime Video commanded 22.5 per cent of all TV usage on the day. Streaming overall accounted for 54 per cent of Christmas Day viewing, the largest single-day share ever logged by the category.

December delivered another first on December 13, when streaming crossed the 50 per cent mark for daily TV usage for the first time, reaching 50.4 per cent.

Across the month, streaming usage rose 3 per cent from November, double the growth rate of total television. Four platforms posted their strongest-ever monthly shares.

Netflix led with 9.0 per cent of total TV viewing, up 10 per cent month on month. Stranger Things alone generated more than 15 billion viewing minutes, making it December’s most-watched streaming title.

Prime Video climbed to 4.3 per cent of TV, rising 12 per cent versus November and beating its previous platform record by 0.3 percentage points. Growth was fuelled by four NFL Thursday Night Football games, including a record-breaking Christmas Day match-up, alongside new episodes of Fallout.

The Roku Channel reached an all-time high of 3.0 per cent of TV viewing, edging up 0.1 percentage point from November, while Paramount Streaming hit a collective 2.5 per cent share across Paramount+ and Pluto. Its original series Landman generated 6.2 billion viewing minutes, ranking as December’s second most-watched streaming title.

Traditional television continued to lose ground. Broadcast accounted for 21.4 per cent of total viewing in December, while cable slipped to 20.2 per cent.

CBS and Fox dominated broadcast rankings. Fox’s Eagles vs Bills NFL game on December 28 topped the month, followed by Steelers vs Lions on CBS on December 21. CBS also claimed the largest non-sports audiences, with Tracker and 60 Minutes each drawing more than 10 million viewers on a live plus seven-day basis.

Cable sports provided a rare bright spot, with viewing up 16 per cent in December to represent 9 per cent of total cable consumption. NFL games filled the top five cable telecasts, led by all four Monday Night Football games on ESPN, followed by NFL Network’s Texans vs Chargers clash on December 27.

The December 2025 reporting period spanned five weeks, from December 1 to December 28, in line with Nielsen’s broadcast calendar.

The message from the data is blunt. Streaming no longer nibbles at television’s edges. It owns the calendar’s biggest days, the industry’s biggest audiences — and increasingly, the screen itself.