streaming does not yet compete with linear television
While you wait to find out all the audience levels for this All-Star weekend, Sports Media Watch gives an overview of the first part of the regular season in the NBA. So far, the games have averaged 1.8 million viewers on NBC Universal, ESPN/ABC and Prime Video.
This volume, which includes data from Adobe Analytics for NBC games, is up 16% from last year and represents the highest average at this point in the season since 2018. Including games broadcast on NBA TV – which airs fewer games under the new media rights deal – the total audience even jumps 38%.
A favorable development for qualifying as Nielsen modified its methodology over the past year to expand its out-of-home viewing sample and move to a new system that integrates TVs connected to its traditional panel. Which tends to skew comparisons with previous years.
Still, “returning” NBC, which is airing the games for the first time since the 2001-02 season, averaged 2.6 million viewers. This ratio marks an increase of… 97% compared to the equivalent slots last year, which were mostly broadcast on TNT.
ESPN/ABC averaged 2.06 million viewers, up 18%. The group’s channels hold five of the top ten audiences of the season, all recorded on “Christmas Day,” including the top three: Spurs-Thunder (6.71 million), Cavaliers-Knicks (6.37 million) and Mavs-Warriors (6.11 million).
The streaming platform Prime Video shows an average of 1.06 million viewers during the 44 broadcast matches. With a generally younger audience than its linear television counterparts.
Streaming still can’t compete with the power of traditional television. Nine of the ten most-watched game windows were broadcast not only on linear television, but more specifically on free-to-air terrestrial networks: the five Christmas games on ABC (and ESPN) or the first games on NBC. The one exception to this dominance: the NBA Cup Finals, which aired on Prime Video.
2026-02-16 09:58:00
