Disney Tops The Media Distributor Gauge In December
Nielsen has released its latest Media Distributor Gauge data for December 2024, which measures how much of each studio’s content is being watched. According to December’s Media Distributor Gauge, Disney holds onto the top spot, beating out NBC Universal and YouTube to take the largest share of television viewing across linear and streaming platforms.
Disney claimed the largest share of TV viewing for a fourth straight month, ranking as the most-watched media distributor with 11.2% of total usage in December. Disney’s 6% month-over-month gain was fueled by strong performances across its cable networks.
Notable contributors included FX with a 45% surge, and Freeform, which nearly doubled its audience with its popular holiday movie marathons. Disney also benefited from football-driven gains on ESPN, as well as from “Bluey” on Disney+, which was the second-most watched streaming title of the month with 5.3 billion total viewing minutes during the December interval.
Unlike most viewership charts, which usually just focus on either streaming or linear viewing, this data highlights how, when combined, the legacy media studios are still more popular than Netflix, which dominates the streaming viewership, but has no linear viewership.
One of the biggest problems with comparing data across different streaming services is that Disney’s content is spread out across different platforms like Hulu and Disney+, and channels like ABC, FX, National Geographic, etc, but this data pulls all of that together, showcasing the overall picture for Disney.
YouTube continues to increase its viewership, up 7% in December, leading the streaming service to its best monthly share of total TV to date with 11.1% of time spent. This is YouTube’s 10th consecutive month ranking as one of the top two media distributors.
Netflix also saw a 14% monthly uptick in viewing when compared to November, leading it to notch 8.5% of total TV watch-time and tie its previous platform high. Netflix’s gains were driven by the two Christmas Day NFL games, in addition to the nearly 15 billion viewing minutes accumulated by popular titles like “Carry-On”, “Squid Game” and “Virgin River”.
Roger’s Take: Disney continues to show why it’s one of the biggest and most popular studios, but as I mentioned earlier, most people don’t tend to think about Disney’s general entertainment studios like 20th Television, FX, ABC and also its popular ESPN platforms.
Do you think Disney will be able to continue to hold onto the first place? Let me know on social media!