Americans’ time spent with media has reportedly reached a plateau, as increases in digital media time are finally unable to offset decreases to traditional media time. The latest annual study [download page] of media consumption trends from Attest confirms that traditional media consumption is declining, and that in fact those drops are extending to some digital media too.
One medium whose consumption continues to be in a structural decline is TV: this year, only 56% of working-age consumers in the US say they watch TV for 3+ hours per day, down from 61% last year, 63% in 2023 and 64% in 2022.
A culprit here is live TV: fully 28% of respondents don’t watch any live TV on a typical day, up from 20% a couple of years ago. This pattern looks unlikely to abate, as younger consumers under 30 are the most likely to avoid live TV on a typical day (41%).
Still, it’s not just live TV: streaming service viewing has also dropped off somewhat this year. The report notes that the percentage of working-age consumers watching streaming services for at least 3 hours a day has slipped by 4% points. The shift has been to more moderate viewing time, as there’s been an increase in the share of respondents watching for 1-2 hours per day.
Meanwhile, although social media’s reach seems to have picked up again, time spent using social media appears to be moderating. The percentage of respondents who are spending at least 3 hours a day with social media has dropped by 6.5% points to 30%. This dip has been particularly significant among 31-49-year-olds, only 27% of whom now spend 3+ hours per day on social media, down from 45% a couple of years ago.
Even the younger crowd is spending less time on social media: while a hefty 46% of 18-29-year-olds record upwards of 3 hours per day, that’s down from 53% last year.
Shifting to audio, the Attest report shows that unlike other media, there’s been a rebound in the share of consumers streaming music on a daily basis, up to 42% from 36% last year. Weekly podcast listening has edged up a point year-over-year to 40% of respondents, in line with other research indicating that 40% of Americans ages 12 and older listen to or watch podcasts on a weekly basis. Per the Attest report, growth in listening among older consumers has offset a drop among the under-30 crowd.
Following in live TV’s decline, daily listening of the radio has slipped, falling to 31% of respondents, down from 32% last year and 37% in 2023.
Finally, the report’s results show that a steady share of respondents this year have a digital content subscription (30%). Weekly print newspaper readership is down (20%, down from 24% last year and 34% in 2023), as is daily digital news consumption (24%, from 26% and 30%, respectively) and weekly print magazine readership (19%, from 21% and 32%, respectively).