NEWS12 July 2016
TV viewing on TV sets has fallen significantly in the last five years, but the drop is greatest among 16-24 year-olds and smallest among over-65s, according to a new Ofcom report.
According to its annual report on public service broadcasting, on average, people in the UK watched three hours and 36 minutes of measured broadcast TV in a typical day in 2015. This is 26 minutes a day less than in 2010.
This represents an 11% fall in time spent watching TV. Among 16-24 year-olds, however, this drop was more than a quarter; among 25-34 year-olds it was 19%; among 35-44 year-olds it was 17%; among 55-64 year-olds it was 5%; and among over-65s the time was largely unchanged.
While the accelerated rate of decline in viewing since 2012 slowed for almost all under-65 age groups between 2014 and 2015, among 16-24 year olds the rate of decline continued to speed up (by 10.5%). This is the biggest annual drop for this age group since 2010.
The decline in TV viewing has largely been attributed to on-demand viewing, such as BBC iPlayer, All4, Netflix and Amazon, with reach rising to around seven in ten among 15-24 year-olds and 25-34 year-olds.