Roku Channel Reaches 120 Million Viewers; Roku Celebrates Over 100 Billion Hours Streamed in 2023
Sales of Roku’s smart TVs slumped during the fourth quarter, but its streaming service The Roku Channel had a successful year.
Roku continued to see more growth in the fourth quarter of 2023, ending a year that was largely successful from the company’s perspective. Roku unveiled its quarterly earnings report this week, announcing that it had 80 million active accounts, and that its free ad-supported streaming service The Roku Channel reached households containing 120 million people during the fourth quarter.
- Roku users streamed 29.1 billion hours’ worth of content in Q4, and 106 billion hours in 2023.
- The company’s average revenue per user fell below $40.
- Total net revenue hit $3.5 billion, which was an 11% year-over-year increase.
Roku announced as part of its earnings report that hours streamed on its platforms totaled 106 billion in 2023, an increase of 18.6 billion hours year-over-year. During Q4, Roku saw 29.1 billion hours streamed, an increase of 2.4 billion hours over Q3's numbers.
Total net revenue was up to $3.5 billion, an 11% year-over-year increase. Roku announced that it had achieved a positive Adjusted EBITDA and free cash flow for the full 2023 year ahead of schedule, but its average revenue per user (ARPU) dropped for the second straight quarter to $39.92.
What’s New With Roku?
The Roku Channel offers more than 350 live streaming channels, and thousands of hours of on-demand content as well. It continued to add new selections for viewers in the last quarter of 2023, including the Tennis Channel’s free ad-supported TV (FAST) channel T2.
Roku is gearing up to launch its new line of higher-end smart TVs. In January, Roku announced that it would roll out its Pro Series televisions, with sizes of 55”, 65”, and 75”, and in the earnings letter distributed to shareholders Roku confirmed that line of sets would begin hitting shelves this spring.
The company could have serious competition for its smart TV manufacturing business soon enough. Recent reports indicate that Walmart is looking to purchase VIZIO, in order to gain control of that manufacturer’s TV operating system. Walmart wants to compete with Roku and other smart TV/streaming device makers, which get more control over customer data and ad revenues on the platforms they create.
Roku knows there’s more room to get advertisers into streaming, and it’s making every effort to bring more ad dollars to streaming platforms. The company cited statistics from Nielsen and eMarketer which state that adults in the United States between ages 18-49 spent more than 60% of their total TV time on streaming services, while advertisers are spending just 29% of their TV budgets on streaming platforms.
Roku Channel
The Roku Channel is a free live TV streaming service that provides 350+ live linear streaming channels and more than 80,000 free movies and TV shows. The library contains entertainment from several different decades, including some major hits.