UK households continue to cancel TV subscription services, with nearly 800,000 binning either their Netflix or Amazon Prime service between April and June as the cost-of-living crisis bites.
Data from BARB, the Broadcast Audience Research Board, found that 19.19mln homes had access to subscription video on demand (SVOD) services in the second quarter, roughly 67% of all households.
That figure is down from the first quarter of the year by 382,000, or 2%.
Netflix, Amazon and NOW TV were hit the hardest, all reporting a quarterly drop in the number of homes with access to their services, although it recently reported global subscription losses weren't as bad as first feared.
A total of 17.08mln homes, or 60%, had access to Netflix in the second quarter, down 206k, or just over 1%. Around 45% of homes, or 12.7mln, had access to Amazon Prime Video, a decrease of 589k, or 4%.
NOW TV was available in 2.07mln homes in the second quarter, a decline of 64k, or almost 3% the first three months of the year.
However, it wasn’t all doom and gloom in the sector, with Disney+ and Amazon reporting marginal gains.
Disney+ saw an increase of 91,000 users to 6.62mln homes while Apple TV saw its subscriptions rise by 43,000 to 1.61mln homes.
“Our latest data confirm other sources which have reported declining subscription levels for SVOD services during the first half of 2022,” said Justin Sampson, chief executive of BARB.
“We don’t ask households why they choose to add or drop subscriptions, although the sharp increase in energy prices in March/April must have been a catalyst for people to review all their monthly outgoings.”
In April, research from Kantar Worldpanel showed that the number of UK homes that had at least one paid-for streaming service had fallen by 215,000 in the first quarter, marking the end of a decade of almost uninterrupted growth.