Women’s NCAA Tournament Boosts Cable; Netflix Dominates Streaming

Once again, TV usage was down in March with broadcast TV receiving the smallest percentage among the primary viewing categories.

Broadcast TV saw a 6% usage decline from February to March, accounting for just 22.5% of viewing. Year-over-year, broadcast viewing has fallen 4%, according to Nielsen‘s monthly report, The Gauge.

On a yearly basis, cable viewing saw the largest usage decline at 10%. However, it remained resilient at 283.% of viewing thanks in part to March Madness. Sports cable viewing was up 43% in the month of March, according to Nielsen, which also notes that the women’s NCAA tournament had a larger impact on viewership than it usually does.

The State of the Union also gave cable a boost, since 32.2M viewers tuned into that March 7 event.

Streaming is still making up the majority of TV usage, only falling 1% from February to represent 38.5% of the total share. As is typical, YouTube took the largest streaming share with 9.7%, but Netflix came in second with 8.1% — led by Love is Blind, The Gentleman, and Avatar: The Last Airbender, which combined for nearly 15 million viewing minutes in the March interval. 

In fact, Nielsen reports that streaming viewership is actually up 12% versus a year ago, despite its drop month-to-month.

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