Survey: Live Sports Are Key Subscription Drivers for Peacock and Paramount+; NFL+ Has More Users Than Sunday Ticket
New data released by Antenna shows that fans who subscribe to streamers for sports can be easier to retain than others.
November is peak season for professional sports. The NFL is about halfway through its regular season, and the NBA and NHL just got started. Fans can enjoy their favorite sports on various streaming platforms this fall, with Max the latest to push its way into sports streaming thanks to the introduction of its Bleacher Report add-on.
- A new report from Antenna demonstrates live sports are a key driver of subscriber acquisition for streamers like Peacock and Paramount+.
- Customers who sign up around the time of a key sports event tend to stick with their chosen streamer longer than the average user.
- The NFL is unsurprisingly a highly popular streaming product, and NFL+ has outpaced NFL Sunday Ticket on YouTube TV in subscribers this year.
How Effectively Do Live Sports Bring Users to Streaming Platforms?
Live sports were always a key part of the traditional cable bundle. But now that only around half of households in the United States have a cable subscription, leagues, and providers are scrambling to determine how they’ll offer fan-favorite matches and still get the same distribution and revenues they saw when cable was at its peak.
New data released in a report by Antenna shows that customers are willing to follow live sports to streaming, at least. Between January of 2021 and September of 2023, Antenna measured sign-ups for Peacock and Paramount+, two streaming services that offer more live sports than most of their subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) competitors. Its numbers indicate that subscriber acquisition for these services frequently spiked around live sporting events like the Super Bowl or NFL Thanksgiving games, which brought in hundreds of thousands of fresh users.
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Best yet for streamers who offer live sports, the customers who come to that platform to watch live sports have a better chance of sticking around than the average streaming subscriber. Antenna measured Peacock subscribers who signed up ahead of a key sporting event and found that WWE, NFL, and English Premier League Soccer fans all stayed subscribed to the platform at a higher rate than benchmark subscribers.
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Live sports aficionados who sign up for a streamer like Peacock are likely retained through the service’s catalog of library and original shows. Once a user watches the sporting event they came for, Antenna’s numbers show they’re likely to find something to stream which keeps their attention until the next sports match they want to see on the service comes on.
NFL+ Outperforming NFL Sunday Ticket, But Why?
Antenna’s numbers also show that the NFL remains a highly popular product, whether on TV or via streaming. The league launched NFL+ ahead of the 2022 season, a platform that allows users to watch any in-market NFL games, plus all nationally broadcast games on channels like ESPN and NFL Network on their mobile devices. Antenna estimates the service surpassed 2 million subscribers in September, after maxing out at 1.7 million in 2022.
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In-market games are clearly attracting a wide audience, but out-of-market NFL games are having a harder time bringing in users. NFL Sunday Ticket is available on YouTube TV for the first time this year, and despite the fact that customers don’t have to have a YouTube TV subscription to get it, the service has only attracted 1.3 million users.
A comparison of the first year of NFL+ and the first year of NFL Sunday Ticket on YouTube TV demonstrates that the former service outperformed the latter, at least thus far. Sunday Ticket could lure more users in thanks to its recent price drop for the second half of the season, but it would have to see a pretty big influx of new users to catch up with NFL+’s first season numbers.
There are a few reasons why NFL+ has more subscribers than Sunday Ticket currently. Obviously, price is first; NFL+ is available for $6.99 per month, or $14.99 if users want to stream NFL RedZone live every single week. NFL Sunday Ticket is 20 times as expensive for a season’s subscription, and it comes with access only to out-of-market games.
By definition, that means Sunday Ticket’s target audience is already smaller than NFL+’s since the majority of NFL fans live in the same market as their favorite team. Pursuing a niche audience with a product that’s only available at a premium price has always been somewhat inefficient, but now that there are so many other ways to get NFL games, many fans are likely wondering why the league hasn’t been able to figure out a more cost-effective way to stream out-of-market games.
As streaming continues to overtake linear TV in terms of audience, platforms will continue to be challenged to find ways to deliver the most sports content to viewers as inexpensively as possible. If they do so, Antenna’s data makes it clear that these platforms can thrive, as sports are a key acquisition driver and better at retaining customers than other types of programming.
Peacock
Peacock is a subscription video streaming service from NBCUniversal that includes original shows, blockbuster movies, and classic television series. Peacock is home to “Yellowstone,” and “The Office,” as well as original hits like “Poker Face” and “Bel-Air.” You can also watch live sports including NFL, MLB, WWE, Olympics, Premier League, NASCAR, French Open, College Football and Basketball, and PGA Tour. Premium Plus subscribers can stream their local NBC feed in all 210 markets.