Edison: In-Car Listening Shows Americans Increasingly On the Move

Edison Research Monday released the latest update of the Share of Ear® report to clients, based on interviews conducted during October, 2020. The listening location data from Share of Ear sheds some light on which locations U.S. listeners are consuming audio now that quarantine restrictions are being lifted in some areas.

• Listening shifts from home back to the car as quarantine restrictions lift in Q3

Prior to COVID-19 restrictions in Q2 2020, 32% of all audio in in the U.S. was consumed in car. When quarantine restrictions went into place in Q2, erasing many Americans’ commutes and greatly reducing travel in general, in-car listening plummeted by 38% so that it accounted for only 20% of all listening. This caused at-home listening in Q2 to soar from 49% of all listening to 70% of all listening, an increase of 43%.

The latest research from Share of Ear, conducted in early September, shows a shift back to the car as quarantine restrictions have been lifted by varying degrees across the country. In-car listening grew from 20% in Q2 to 28% today, not quite equal to the pre-COVID number of 32% of all listening.

An increase of Q3 audio consumption in car means a decrease at home, where we see at-home listening levels fall from 70% in Q2 (the beginning of quarantine) to 59% of all listening today.

• At-home listening levels still higher than before quarantine

At-home listening, although at lower levels since Q2, is still 10 points higher than pre-COVID listening. With a U.S. workforce that has seen many employees transition to home office environments, future surveys will bear out whether or not this is a permanent shift.

• At-work listening sees gains

When quarantine restrictions began in Q2, at-work listening fell by almost half from 15% of all listening to 8%. The latest research in Q3 shows that at-work listening has slightly rebounded, growing from 8% to 10% of all audio consumption, an increase of 25%.

Please click here for more information on Edison Research’s Share of Ear®.