NBA League Pass Doubled Subscriber Total, Viewership in 2022-23 Regular Season; NBA Sets Multi-Platform Records
It’s a good time to be a basketball fan. With the NBA’s postseason kicking off on Tuesday, April 11 with the 2023 Play-In Tournament, the next two months will be jam-packed with hardcourt action. But, the entire 2022-23 season has seen record engagement for the Association as the NBA set a number of records and crossed multiple milestones during the regular season.
The NBA’s out-of-market game package, NBA League Pass saw substantial growth this season, fueled in no small part to exciting new content options alongside the traditional game broadcasts that fans have come to expect from the service. Earlier this year, League Pass launched “Throw it Down with Bill Walton,” a unique and eclectic alternate broadcast for select games featuring the iconic Hall of Famer, Dead-Head, and general basketball on vivant.
Also a big part of League Pass’ success this season was “NBA CrunchTime,” a regular whip-around show that allows hoops heads to sample all of the most exciting action around the league at once, along with stats, analysis, and highlights. In total, NBA League Pass saw a 50% growth in subscribers year-over-year and its viewership increased 48%.
Related: NBA ‘Crunchtime’ Gets Big Platform Monday as It Attempts to Change How Fans Watch Basketball
This increase in subscriber numbers could very well be tied to the fact that League Pass slashed the price of its service for the 2022-23 season. As the campaign tipped off, the NBA cut the price of the package by $100, and obviously fans took notice. The league did not provide specific viewership totals, but did also add some pretty impressive details on another streaming front.
This season, the NBA’s YouTube channel apparently became the first pro sports league account to surpass 20 million subscribers and 12 billion lifetime video views. During the season, every three months, the league reached more than 75 million unique viewers on YouTube, and those basketball fans watched more than 35 minutes of NBA content on average.
Timed with the start of the season last fall, the NBA launched an updated NBA App that included “NBA CrunchTime,” pre and post-game coverage, and more. One of the other major advancements that the new and improved app provided was a significant decrease in streaming latency.
Since launching last September, the NBA App increased its downloads by 40% and generated over 1 billion video views, tripling the previous season’s total. The increased attention to the app was helped by NBA ID, the new global membership program that offers fans rewards and benefits and live streams of games featuring French basketball star and 2023 NBA Draft prospect Victor Wembanyama.
The NBA App is a partnership between the league and Warner Bros. Discovery, which owns NBA broadcaster TNT and operates the league-owned NBA TV. On Wednesday, April 12, WBD will be unveiling its new and improved streaming service — presumably renamed Max — and there is the belief that the platform will include more live-sports, and given the growing streaming success of the NBA, it wouldn’t be a shock if basketball features heavily in those plans.
NBA League Pass
For basketball fans, NBA League Pass offers the opportunity to follow one team or the entire league with every game (blackout restrictions apply). Prices and features vary greatly, depending on what you’d like to watch.