Streaming spending drops, but customers still shell out $500 yearly for services
Streaming spending drops, but customers still shell out $500 yearly for services
The average consumer is spending more than $3,000 per year on media, including streaming subscriptions.
With 2024 drawing to a close, many individuals and families are doing a review of their annual budget to prepare for the new year. Media is an important part of any household spending checklist; having a cellphone and an internet connection are considered musts in modern society, even if the yearly outlay for such services takes a big chunk of a consumer’s income. A new survey from Reviews.org does a good job of breaking down how the public spends its media dollars each year, including the average household streaming budget.
Key Details:
- The average consumer spends $3,275 per year for various media services.
- The average streaming budget per customer is now $500 per year, a drop from 2023.
- The spread of ad-supported plans and less stacking is leading to the overall streaming budget decrease.
Staying connected is incredibly important in our modern world, and the survey from Reviews.org reflects how crucial consumers think it is to keep themselves logged on. The average person spends $3,275 per year for their various media services, including internet, mobile phone, streaming, and pay-TV costs.
The last of these obligations is the most expensive; the survey found that the average viewer pays $88.94 per month for a cable package. In fact, cable was the only media segment included in the survey that consumers spent more on in 2024 as compared to 2023.
Streaming costs per month are around $42.38, translating to an annual payout of $508.56 per household on streaming services.
Credit: Reviews.org
The cost of streaming per year may seem high at first glance, but the average monthly spend for streaming services has actually fallen by $13 in 2024. This is almost certainly accounted for by viewers stacking fewer streamers every month, and the onset of ad-supported plans. Prime Video became the last of the so-called “Big Five” streamers to roll out an ad-supported tier when it launched its ad plan in January.
Digging a little deeper into the survey, Reviews.org found that the average American only pays for two streaming services each month. More than one in four (27.8%) say they have experienced streaming fatigue, and that the issue worsens when there are more services available to stack.
Streaming fatigue may be an issue, but the continued rise in pay-TV prices will almost certainly lead to more and more customers cutting the cord in the near future. Staying connected is highly critical for American consumers, even if the price rises to over $3,000 each year.
Amazon Prime Video
Amazon Prime Video is a subscription video streaming service that includes on-demand access to 10,000+ movies, TV shows, and Prime Originals like “The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power,” “Jack Ryan,” “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel,” “The Boys,” and more. Subscribers can also add third-party services like Max, Showtime, STARZ, and dozens more with Amazon Prime Video Channels. Prime Video also offers exclusive live access to NFL Thursday Night Football.