More than half (56 per cent) of sport fans said they would pay more for a streaming channel than their current pay-TV sports offering, according to Brightcove’s Q3 2019 Global Video Index.
The report found that half of sport fans watch supplemental sports programming, with 60 per cent of Millennials saying that extra content was important to them.
“And the leagues are listening,” said the report. “The NBA this year, for example, launched an OTT offering. Amazon has continued to work with the NFL and Thursday Night Football, DAZN is making a huge play for the UK’s Champions League rights and Spain’s top football league, LaLiga, is looking for new ways to take its OTT play, LaLigaSports TV, to an international audience this year.”
Smartphones account more than half (54 per cent) of all sport video views and saw the number of video starts increase 49 per cent in the past year, compared to a 22 per cent increase in Q2. Completion rate on smartphones is around 42 per cent – “an indication that mobile devices are used primarily to “touch base” with an event, check scores, watch highlights and the like,” the report noted.
Brightcove also reported the uptake in short-form video, accounting for 11 times more views in Q3 than medium-form video and six times as many as long-form. “Short-form remains the bulk of videos on the internet,” said the report, adding: “There have been some changes in the devices we use to watch.”
The number of short-form videos played on smartphones increased by 73 per cent, followed by views on connected TVs (49 per cent), tablets (39 per cent) and computers (37 per cent).
