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As writers and actors’ strikes hits film and TV productions, survey finds budgets for Netflix and its rivals are stretched to the limit.
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Plethora of streaming services confront subscription fatigue
17 July 2023
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10 minute read
Growth of streaming services such as Netflix has hit the skids with signs of subscription fatigue and a 13 percentage point decline in the number of consumers streaming more this year, according to research by consultancy Simon-Kucher.
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The survey showed just 36 per cent had increased consumption of streaming in 2023 and free-to-air services were closing the gap on subscriptions and now accounted for one-third of streaming, up 8 percentage points on last year.
The survey also revealed a decrease in willingness-to-pay per subscription and a decline in the average number of subscriptions to 2.5.
The results come as much of the film and TV industry has been forced to shut down due to a writers’ strike since early May, which has now been joined by the actors’ unions. The strike action will eventually flow through to reduced content for streaming services.
Simon-Kucher global head of media Lisa Jaeger said consumer expectations would be critical as price became more of an issue for subscribers.
“We are now seeing some evidence of saturation in the market – a broad variety of providers are fighting for the time and budgets of consumers,” she said.
“As consumers are becoming more and more price sensitive, cancellations will also become more likely unless service providers are able to meet consumer expectations and prove the value of their product.”
The survey, which took in 12 nations, found Australians ranked frequency of new content highly but price was the most important purchase criterion and Australian budgets were “almost used up” with very little room for cost increases of existing services or new low-priced subscriptions.
Among Australian survey respondents, 45 per cent would cancel an existing subscription in favour of a new one, 34 per cent did cancel a subscription within the last year and 39 per cent intend to cancel one within the upcoming year. Overall, the average number of subscriptions per respondent in Australia decreased by 10 per cent compared to last year.
Internationally, China had the biggest drop in streaming subscriptions per respondent (a 43 per cent decrease) while Brazil (no change) and Spain (a 3 per cent increase) were the only countries yet to see a decline.
TV series remained the most popular content at 76 per cent, ahead of movies on 75 per cent and live events at 38 per cent for live events such as sport.
Both TV series and live events were down 7 per cent compared to last year.
The Global Streaming Study 2023 quizzed more than 12,000 consumers in 12 countries including Australia, Brazil, China, France, Germany, India, Netherlands, Singapore, Spain, Sweden, UK and US.
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