New research from Ampere Analysis highlights the importance of live sports to US streaming platforms.
According to the company's latest consumer survey, streaming platforms that held rights to NFL games saw a far greater boost in monthly active viewing in the first quarter of 2024 than those platforms without NFL rights.
The biggest winner was Paramount+, which had rights to the Super Bowl LVIII.
"The growth in viewership for platforms holding NFL rights shows how important tier 1 sports rights can be to streaming platforms, especially in an increasingly competitive streaming market," said Minal Modha, Research Director at Ampere Analysis, in a statement. "While most US domestic rights have now been tied up, Q2 will likely see the awarding of the NBA rights, the last chance for platforms or streamers to get a seat at the table for a significant amount of time. As streaming platforms try to diversify revenue streams through advertising, live sports will play a bigger role in helping to guarantee eyeballs, thereby pushing up advertising value”
Ampere reports that all US streaming platforms that hold NFL rights saw average growth in monthly active viewers of 14% between Q3 2023 and Q1 2024, compared to 10% growth across SVoD platforms as a whole.
As a way of further comparison, in Q1 2024, 50% of US Internet users claimed to have used Amazon Prime in the past month (+8%), 22% used Paramount+ (+22%) and 21% used Peacock (+18%).
But this monthly active viewing increases even further among NFL fans. Amazon Prime rises to 59%, Paramount+ to 30%, and Peacock to 28%, highlighting how this cohort is driving engagement.
It's important to note this data tracks active monthly viewers of these services and it is not a reflection of raw subscriber numbers.
