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Ofcom: Digital video subscriptions overtake pay TV services in UK

Digital platform subscriptions have overtaken subscription of traditional pay television services for the first time in the UK, according to a comprehensive Ofcom report.

The Media Nation 2018 report, which has been published by Ofcom today states SVoD (subscription video on demand) services Netflix, Amazon and NOW TV hailed 15.4 million subscribers in the first quarter, ahead of 15.1 million pay-TV contracts. However, this figure includes subscriptions to multiple SVoD services within one household: 11.1 million households (39.4%) have at least one of either Netflix, Amazon or NOW TV. Despite this, traditional pay TV services such as Sky and cable services, generated significantly more revenue than video-on-demand subscriptions.

The major SVoD services all had rapid growth in subscriber numbers in 2017 and the first quarter of 2018. Amazon Prime Video had slightly larger year-on-year growth than Netflix, up by 32.7% to reach 4.8 million subscribers in Q1 2018. However, Netflix remains by far the most popular SVoD service, and in Q1 2018 it was in 9.1 million UK households (a 32.2% increase since Q1 2017).