2024 State of Play
Global streaming insights and the content that keeps viewers hitting play
The importance of content has never been greater for global streaming services. Now evolved from subscription-driven growth strategies, providers are leaning into a mix of high-profile originals, sports and deep content libraries to entice viewers and keep them engaged once they’ve tuned in.
This year’s State of Play report highlights key findings from an in-depth analysis of the content distributed by the industry’s leading subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) services. Streaming platforms, publishers and studios can use these insights to refine their distribution strategies and develop personalized content journeys for audiences who are hungry for content, yet unsure how to find what they’re looking for.
Key report findings:
- 93% of the content that global SVOD services offer is exclusive to an individual service, but much of it isn’t being watched.
- Licensed TV shows drive nearly twice the viewership of original programming, but much of that viewership is for non-exclusive content.
- Less than 12% of SVOD content was produced before 1990, and over 80% was produced in the last 35 years.
- SVOD content is increasingly global: only 44% was produced in the U.S.
- Drama is the dominant genre and tense is the most common mood across SVOD content.
Live sports and news are the new heavyweights on FAST channels
FAST audiences have 26.6% more news programs and 37.5% more sports programs to choose from than they did a year ago.
Why your LLM thinks “The Madison” is in Wisconsin
LLMs will play a key role in content discovery, but successful AI strategies won’t be built with bigger models.
Can AI find the right TV episode? Not reliably.
Without proper grounding, LLM responses about TV episodes will usually be incorrect.