TV viewing trends in Canada

We create our hot topic audience report at the end of every TV season so that our clients have quick and easy access to the TV viewing trends in Canada.

The seasonality of TV viewing plays a critical role in programming and media planning and buying.  In particular, fall remains a key period for the TV industry, as this is when many new and returning shows start. How well the shows perform during this time period determines whether they’ll return in the spring.

What our report covers

1. Average time spent watching TV by season.
2. Share of viewing trends by station groups (ie conventional vs specialty TV).
3. Top performing TV stations including AMA (000s) and share of viewing.
4. Top performing TV programs including ratings and percentage of live viewing.

Clients with a TV PPM subscription can access this report either through the Lens platform or from the homepage of InfoSys+TV PPM.

Fall TV viewing overview

Viewing figures were initially impacted significantly by the COVID-19 pandemic. At the beginning of the first lockdown period (Spring 2020) viewing to news stations grew while viewing to sports stations fell with the lack of live content. Since that time, viewing patterns have somewhat followed previous years’ with a dip in the summer and an increase again between Fall and Spring.

TV viewing during Fall 2021 followed that pattern with Ind2+ watching on average 1 hour more TV than during the Summer season (almost 3 hours more in Quebec Franco market). In addition, the lack of election drama in the US meant that share of viewing for Ind2+ to Canadian stations was higher this year than last Fall (87.1% vs 82.1% last year). Viewing to CNN (US Specialty) alone dropped 63% year on year.

Fall TV station & program highlights

• The sports networks, TSN & Sportsnet, take the specialty channel top spots for A25-54. Sportsnet National, helped by the Blue Jays’ performance and a regular hockey season, moves from 10^th place last Fall to 2^nd place this year.
• In Quebec Franco, the news channel LCN has regained the top spot from TVA sports for specialty stations across A25-54.
• Each of the Anglo markets have a different top show for Ind2+ from Survivor in Toronto to Global News in Vancouver. However, The Good Doctor remains the top show across Anglo Canada as it has for the past 4 Fall seasons.
• The popularity of District 31 shows no sign of waning either, with it achieving a rating of 24 for Ind2+ in the Quebec Franco market, making it the number 1 spot for Total Canada overall.

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Top 10 Fall TV shows

This report is created using Conex. This tool accesses Numeris TV PPM data directly and feeds it seamlessly into data visualization tools, such as Excel or Microsoft PowerBI. This allows you to spend far less time creating reports and more time finding the insights you need and acting on them