Insight

What is event television? You might think of it as appointment-to-view TV – a programme that you have to watch live in order to be part of the conversation, rather than catch up on at a later date. It may also be something that you watch with others, be it other household members, or by inviting guests to watch with you.

In this month’s edition of What People Watch, we are looking at some of the programmes that aired this month that fit the bill of event television better than any other: The Coronation of The King and Queen Camilla, Eurovision and the FA Cup semi-final.

Firstly, let’s start by looking at the programmes this year that have had the highest co-viewing audience (that is watching with at least one other person) based on live viewing.

Table 1: 2023 programmes with the highest live co-viewing
Source : Barb live viewing, all individuals 4+, Jan 1st – May 14th 2023, excluding programmes under 5 mins duration. *The Coronation is based on viewing for the service 11:00-12:59 across 11 channels and services.

The Coronation and Eurovision take the top two spots, with 66% and 72% of the audience co-viewing respectively, followed by watercooler dramas and entertainment shows, sporting events and news broadcasts.

We can delve into the viewing for the Coronation and Eurovision further, together with viewing for the FA Cup semi-final game placed ninth in the table.

Charts 1 and 2 look at the demographic of viewing for viewing for these three events.

Chart 1: Viewing by age

Chart 2: Viewing by gender
Source : Barb live viewing, all individuals 4+

We can see that all three of these programmes had a broad demographic appeal. As you might expect, the FA Cup semi-final skewed more male, whereas the Coronation and Eurovision had a slightly higher female audience. The Coronation and the FA Cup semi-final skewed older, whereas almost a fifth of Eurovision viewers were 16-34 – although a sizeable proportion, 44%, were aged 55+.

Our data also enable us to see which devices viewers used to watch these programmes on. Non-TV set viewing for all three of these titles amounted to under 2.1% of live viewing. It’s unsurprising that for event television like this, people choose to watch on the largest possible screen, which is best for multiple people to watch together.

Returning to co-viewing, for each of these three titles, we can find out the proportion of viewing that was with at least one other household member and viewing that was with a guest of the household. (chart 3).

Chart 3: Viewing with others
Source : Barb live viewing, all individuals 4+

On average, we know that for live viewing in the evening (18:00-24:00) from January 1st to May 14th 2023, 45% of viewing was watching with others, and just 3% occurred with guests in the home.

By contrast, all three of these events have higher than average levels of co-viewing with other household members. The FA Cup semi-final, with 58% of the total audience co-viewing, is also higher than the 28% co-viewing across sports channels on average (from January 1st to May 14th 2023, excluding Sky Sports News).

Turning to viewing with guests from outside the household, the average for this for live viewing in the evening from January 1st to May 14th 2023 this year was just 3%. All three of these events saw significantly higher levels of guest viewing. It’s clear that the tradition of Coronation and Eurovision parties is alive and well!

The co-viewing figures for the FA Cup could increase further for the final next month, which will be available to watch across multiple channels and services.

Next month will also feature the Champion’s League final. Last year, BT chose to make this available via BT Sport and on YouTube, and we know that 28% of the total audience watched via YouTube on a TV set.

We will also be able to see what the levels of co-viewing for this year’s final will be. Last year, 36% of viewing for the Champion’s League final on a TV set was co-viewing. However, looking at the viewing via YouTube on a TV set, only 7% of this viewing was with at least one other person.

Overall, it’s clear that event television remains an important type of programming for broadcasters, as well as for streaming services in the shape of key sporting fixtures. It will be interesting to see whether the co-viewing levels for event television such as the Champion’s League final on BT Sport and YouTube can ever match the heady heights of the annual Eurovision viewing parties.

Neil Jones, Head of Insight, Barb