Digital Live Sports Viewing Jumps 466 Percent Since 2018

The number of live sports viewers tuning in through traditional pay-TV services will continue its decline, averaging a rate of 4.4% year-over-year over the next five years, according to eMarketer. Their latest forecast on live sports states that traditional TV viewership reached more than 100 million in 2018.

However, this year, it will drop below 90 million for the first time. By 2028 it will approach 70 million. Despite the drop in traditional TV broadcasts, digital sports viewership has increased steadily. By the end of 2024, live sports viewers watching via traditional cable and satellite providers will drop 5.5% to 85.72 million. This comes after years of negative growth, except for a pandemic bump in 2021.

Growth will remain negative through the end of the forecast period (2028) when the number of viewers will have dropped to 72.5 million. In terms of penetration, this year 25.1% of the US population (all ages) watched live sports via traditional TV.  That figure will drop to 20.7% by 2028.

The decline comes as viewers increasingly turn to digital providers for live sports, which have struck deals in recent years to carry more live sporting events. Digital live sports viewers will grow 10.2% in 2024 to reach 105.28 million. For perspective, that figure was just 18.6 million in 2018, a jump of 466.0% in 6 years.

“As high-value sports licenses come up for renewal, they’re increasingly flowing to streaming platforms,” says Paul Verna, VP of Emarketer content. “These include services run by legacy media companies such as Comcast, Disney, and Paramount Global, but also video apps from tech giants like Amazon, Google, and Apple. For example, the NBA’s 11-year, $76 billion rights package went to Comcast’s NBCU, Disney’s EPSN, and Amazon. The latter has also actively licensed live sports from the NFL and MLB in recent years. The trend is clear: the future of sports media is digital.”

The decline of live sports viewing via cable and satellite comes amidst still-declining traditional TV viewership overall. Just 111.1 million US adults will watch traditional TV this year, after peaking in 2013 at 206.8 million. At its peak, more than 80% of the adult population watched traditional TV. The penetration rate this year will be just 41.5%. Looking ahead, traditional TV viewership will drop to 85.6 million by 2028, or just 31.1% of the population.

Advertisers are following the viewers. Television ad dollars continue their long downward slide, propped up minimally this year by the presidential election. Following a peak in 2018 at more than $72 billion, traditional TV ad spend will be just $58.99 billion this year.  Next year it will decline by another 13.3% to hit $51.14 billion.

Meanwhile, advertising on streaming platforms continues its meteoric rise. This year, connected TV ad spending will jump 18.8% to $28.75 billion. While the growth rate is slowing, it will continue to climb at a double-digit rate yearly, and by 2028, it will nearly equal that of traditional TV ad spending.