Report: TV Viewer's Core Group of Channels Shrinking

In a second-quarter 2016 survey done by TiVo’s Digitalsmiths, the company says 83% of consumers watch 10 or fewer channels, with 2% fewer respondents watching 11 to 20-plus channels -- down 1.5% versus a year ago; 2.0% from two years ago, and 4.1% from three years ago.

This was the result when responding to the question: “How many channels do you typically watch, on average?”

According to a story at Mediapost, the number of those who “feel overwhelmed” by the amount of channel options is slightly growing -- now 32.3% from 28% three years ago.

At the time, the survey noted a slight decline in respondents who were interested in so-called “skinny bundles” -- down 3% from a 76.8% interest level versus a year ago.

Of those who are interested, the average price for what people would pay for a skinny bundled TV network is slightly up to $41.04 -- $3.60 per channel -- $1.52 higher than in the first quarter 2016.

The survey was done in the second quarter, interviewing 3,114 viewers in the U.S. and Canada. Digitalsmiths offers content discovery/search services for TV-video providers.