More streamers than ever are disrupting overall viewership as the industry continues to diversify — but subscriber base size is still key, and that meant Netflix (NASDAQ: NFLX) dominated the list of the most streamed programs last year.
Disney (NYSE: DIS), although – which is catching up in terms of subscribers worldwide – appeared several times on the overall list and showed its dominance in terms of the most watched streaming movies.
Stranger Things ( NFLX ) was the most-streamed program in all of 2022, according to Nielsen, with a whopping 52 billion minutes streamed — more than 36% more minutes than its next closest competitor, NCIS (38.1B minutes). Those 52 billion minutes were the most since the COVID-19 pandemic pushed up viewing Office to 57.1 billion minutes in 2020.
NCIS streams on Paramount+ (PARA) (PARAA), but also on Netflix (NFLX), which means that Netflix had a foothold among the four best streamed programs of the year: Stranger Things, NCIS, a small blow CoComelon (37.8 billion minutes) i Ozark (31.3 billion minutes).
In total, Americans streamed more than 19.4 million years in content last year — a 27% increase from a total of about 15 million in 2021, Nielsen noted.
And the streaming company’s original content rose to a new high in 2022, thanks in large part to Netflix originals (Netflix released the top 10 most-watched original shows: Stranger Things, Ozark, Wednesday, Cobra Kai, Bridgerton, Virgin River, Dahmer, Love is Blind, Inventing Anna and Crown).
However, newer streamers are filling out their viewership with library content – and purchased programs accounted for 11 of the top 15 programs overall. I am rounding off the top 10 behind me Stranger Things, NCIS, CoComelon and Ozark: no. 5, Charm (DIS), 27.4B minutes; Not. 6, Grey’s Anatomy (NFLX), 26.8 billion minutes; no. 7, Criminal minds (miscellaneous), 24.9B minutes; no. 8, Bluey (DIS), 21.1B minutes; no. 9, Gilmore Girls (NFLX), 20.8 billion minutes; and no. 10, Seinfeld (NFLX), 19.3 billion minutes.
Amazon Prime Video (NASDAQ: AMZN) investments in originals brought him to two places on that chart: Boys at number 11 (10.6B minutes); and Rings of Power at number 15 (9.4B minutes). And HBO Max (WBD) put Friends in the list of downloaded programs in 11th place (14.54 billion minutes of stream).
Meanwhile, Disney ( DIS ) claimed 10 of the top 15 movie streaming slots, including the top two s Charm (viewed 269M times) i Turn red (11.427B minutes). Netflix ( NFLX ) had the only movie to stream more than 10 billion minutes Sing 2 (11.347B minutes).
(Nielsen’s streaming ratings now include viewing from seven major streamers: Amazon Prime Video ( AMZN ), Apple TV+ ( AAPL ), Disney+ ( DIS ), HBO Max ( WBD ), Hulu ( DIS ) ( CMCSA ), Netflix ( NFLX ), and Peacock (CMCSA).)