FOX posts the strongest monthly growth, with several NFL and NCAA football distributors seeing double-digit growth in September.
ESPN and ESPN2 are each seeing monthly increases above 100%, helping to boost Disney.
NEW YORK – October 22, 2024 – The return of the NFL and NCAA football kicked off significant gains for media companies in September, as Disney retook the top spot with 11.3% of television and marked the third change in consecutive monthly leader in Nielsen’s media distributor gauge. Disney saw a 17% increase in viewership in September and added 1.8 points of market share compared to August – the largest increase in market share among all reported distributors. Disney’s 17% growth can be attributed to gains from ESPN (+101%) and ESPN2 (+165%), as well as its ABC broadcast subsidiaries (+25%).
While NFL and college football games were the main drivers of the various viewership increases noted in September’s 2024 Gauge report, the Media Distributor Gauge provides additional insight into how these increases affected media companies. In addition to Disney, other distributors recorded double-digit audience increases in September, including FOX (+18%) and Amazon (+13%). Like Disney, FOX also saw a considerable increase in viewership for its affiliate channels, which increased by 69% compared to August. Overall, FOX’s share of TV viewing jumped to 7.3% (+1.3 pt.) in September, and Amazon finished with 3.7% of TV viewing (+0, 5 pt.), which constitutes a new record for the continuous distributor.
Ultimately, as viewers shifted to football in September, eight of 14 reported media companies saw viewership declines this month, including NBCU. Despite a 4.1 point drop in market share after a record August thanks to the Olympics, NBCU would likely have shown similar growth to the aforementioned distributors. NBCU still managed to rank in the top three, behind YouTube, with 9.3% market share.
As viewing habits continue to be impacted by seasonality and sports, a maximized cross-platform approach to audience engagement, as we saw in August and September, will be an important strategic mechanism in the months future.
The measurement month of September 2024 consists of five weeks: from 08/26/2024 to 09/29/2024. Nielsen measurement weeks run from Monday to Sunday.
About The Gauge™
The Gauge™ is Nielsen’s monthly snapshot of the total broadcast, cable and streaming consumption that occurs across a television screen, providing the industry with a holistic overview of what audiences are watching. The Gauge was expanded in April 2024 to include The Media Distributor Gaugewhich reflects total listening per media distributor across these categories. Learn more about the Gauge methodology and FAQs.
About Nielsen
Nielsen is a global leader in audience measurement, data and analytics. Through our understanding of people and their behaviors across all channels and platforms, we empower our clients with independent, actionable insights so they can connect and engage with their global audiences, today and tomorrow. future. To learn more, visit www.nielsen.com and connect with us on social media (X, LinkedIn, YouTube, Facebook et Instagram).
Contact presse
Lauren Pabst
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