Global consumers will spend an average of 67 minutes a day watching online video this year, up from 56 minutes last year. By 2020 the average person will be spending 84 minutes a day watching videos online. In that year, China will have the keenest viewers, with the average person spending 105 minutes a day watching online video, followed by Russia (102 minutes) and the UK (101 minutes).
These are some of the findings by Zenith’s ‘Online Video Forecasts 2018’, published today. This rapid rise in consumption is leading to a shift in the way brands plan campaigns across both television and online video.
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Zenith’s report contains historical data and forecasts of online video consumption and advertising, together with commentaries on the development of individual markets by local experts.
Online video means all video content viewed over an internet connection, including broadcaster-owned platforms such as Hulu, ‘over-the-top’ subscription services like Netflix, video-sharing sites, e.g. YouTube, and videos viewed on social media.
Push to online usage
Global online video consumption grew by 11 minutes a day in 2017, and Zenith expects it to grow by an average of 9 minutes a day each year to 2020. It accounts for almost all the growth in total Internet use, and is growing faster than media consumption overall, so it is taking consumption time from traditional media.
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Although some of this extra viewing is going to non-commercial platforms such as Amazon Prime and Netflix, plenty of it is going to commercial platforms, so the supply of commercial audiences is rising rapidly.
Zenith estimates that online video adspend grew 20% in 2017, to reach US$27bn. Growth peaked at 36% in 2014 and has fallen steadily since then, but still remains very high.
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It forecast 19% growth in 2018, and an average of 17% annual growth to 2020, when online video adspend will reach US$43bn. Video’s share of online display advertising is rising steadily: it accounted for 27% of display adspend in 2017, and it expects it to account for 30% in 2020.
