Australians flock to ad-supported streaming plans amid cost of living pressures

Dylan Crismale - Digital Content Editor

Last updated 03 September 2024

Ad-supported plans now account for 11% of the total number of streaming video subscriptions in Australia, according to new research by technology analyst Telsyte.

The number of ad-supported services such as those introduced on Netflix, Binge and Paramount Plus grew massively with 2.5 million subscriptions in June 2024 compared to around one million the previous year.

The appetite for ad-supported tiers is expected to grow with the Australian Subscription Entertainment Study 2024 finding 45% of streaming video on demand (SVOD) users are interested in ad-supported plans, an increase of 9 percentage points from the year before.

This follows as the top SVOD service costs have increased drastically between 10 and 67% since June 2020.

The overall number of SVOD services itself grew by 4% in the 12 months to June 2024 while the overall market (including SVOD, music, and game subscription services) grew by 5%.

Over 70% of subscribers are signed up to more than one service with the average number of subscriptions per household sitting at 3.5. Telsyte expects the addition of more ad-supported plans could see the average closer to 3.7 by 2028.

Among those surveyed the average monthly budget for SVOD services was $36, a 2% decrease. The consumers most affected by increasing costs were young families and individuals with a medium income.

Nearly half of those surveyed said they would potentially be interested in bundling multiple services to save costs with the same number saying they would consider subscribing to new services if they came with a bundled discount with services they were already paying for.

Eligible Optus customers can access up to 10% bundling discount with its SubHub platform while Hubbl owners can save up to $15 per month on eligible services for three years from purchase.

Looking at the spread of service providers, Netflix maintained its lead as the most popular service with 6.2 million subscriptions at the end of June 2024. It was followed by Amazon's Prime Video (4.8 million) and Disney Plus (3.1 million) as the second and third most popular services.

Other services with more affordable prices and more specialised programming grew collectively by 1%. British TV-focused service BritBox grew the fastest while CrunchyRoll (specialising in anime) and Hayu (specialising in reality TV) also performed strongly.

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Dylan Crismale

Digital Content Editor

Dylan Crismale is a Digital Content Editor at WhistleOut, has been writing for almost a decade across a variety of Australian publications. He previously worked as a writer at Finder covering energy, internet and mobile plans. Dylan is passionate about finding the best deals to save people money and educating people about tech. When he's not sat at his desk Dylan loves working out, bingeing TV and hanging out with friends.

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