TV Viewing Up 7%: comScore Report

comScore, moving into the TV market, said that the amount of time viewers spent watching was up 7% in fourth-quarter 2015.

comScore’s 2015 Cross-Platform Future in Focus report said that in viewing households, 1,004 hours were spent watching live TV, up from 936 hours a year ago. Time spent watching programs on DVRs up to 15 days after they originally aired also rose, to 356 hours from 332 hours.

“The availability of more viewing options appealing to a wider array of tastes, in addition to the continued expansion of premium, original, scripted programming on cable networks, has likely contributed to this effect,” the comScore report said.

Earlier this year, comScore, which specialized in measuring Web usage, acquired Rentrak, which uses set-top box data to gauge TV viewing.

Among millennials, time spent viewing live TV has been eclipsed by use of desktop computers and mobile devices. Live TV still accounts for 47% of time spent.

“It’s possible that digital share of time spent among 25-54 year-olds might also soon surpass live TV," the report said.

Read more at broadcastingcable.com.

Jon Lafayette

Jon has been business editor of Broadcasting+Cable since 2010. He focuses on revenue-generating activities, including advertising and distribution, as well as executive intrigue and merger and acquisition activity. Just about any story is fair game, if a dollar sign can make its way into the article. Before B+C, Jon covered the industry for TVWeek, Cable World, Electronic Media, Advertising Age and The New York Post. A native New Yorker, Jon is hiding in plain sight in the suburbs of Chicago.