MUMBAI: New TV viewing figures from Thinkbox reveal that 98.5 per cent of television viewing is still done on the traditional TV set in the UK, while 1.5 per cent is on other screens such as tablets and mobile devices.
The average daily TV viewing in the UK (during January to June 2013) was four hours, one minute a day per person. This was comprised of three hours, 58 minutes a day of linear TV on a TV set – this is three minutes a day less than the same period last year – and three minutes, 30 seconds a day via devices such as tablets, smartphones and laptops. The majority of this is on-demand viewing, with some live streams.
Viewing on non-TV devices via established services such as ITV Player, Sky Go, 4OD and BBC iPlayer, as well as new services like Dave on-demand, accounted for 1.5 per cent of overall TV viewing in the country during the first half of 2013. This is a slight increase from the full-year figure for 2012, when it accounted for 1.2 per cent.
According to Broadcasters’ Audience Research Board (BARB), it’s estimated that 58 per cent of households own digital TV recorders, and in these homes 83.8 per cent of linear TV was watched live during the period, down from the 84.4 per cent in the same period a year ago. Also, 81 per cent of all time shifted viewing is watched within two days of recording, while 47 per cent is seen within 24 hours of it being recorded. BARB’s figures suggest that the growth in the number of TVs that is recorded and played back is slowing down.
