Asia and Latin America saw the highest growth at 90% and 70% respectively while North America, which the study considers the most mature streaming market in the world, also grew 5% YoY.

As the global streaming industry matures, streaming success is getting more complicated. Device fragmentation is growing, and viewers’ quality expectations are rising with an ad-supported streaming world.

Streaming publishers are challenged to deliver a consistent and positive experience. Whether in Africa using an Android phone or in Texas on a Smart TV – viewers expect a quality picture, instant access to content and zero glitches.

“The race is on to see which publishers will meet these expectations, including providing the best experience when it’s most important,” said Conviva president and CEO Keith Zubchevich.

“Those who do will quickly eclipse the competition. Most importantly, those who make it a priority to obtain real-time actionable insights about their customers’ (real-world experiences) will undoubtedly separate the leaders from the pack,” added Zubchevich.

Conviva highlighted the following findings in its report:

Bitrates are rising
Conviva found bitrate rose globally in Q2 2022 across all screen types and devices, but often at the expense of other quality metrics.

For example, Smart TVs saw the highest increase in bitrate of all screen types up by 15.1% YoY.

However, to provide this more high-definition experience, Smart TVs saw noticeable increases in video start failures, video start time, and buffering.

Conversely, PlayStation and Roku were the only big screen devices to both decrease video start times (down 10.7% and 12% respectively) and increase bitrate (up 4.6% and 12.9% respectively).

Big screens and Roku remain on top
Streaming company Roku remains at the top among big screen devices (big screens include connected TVs, Smart TVs and gaming consoles), holding nearly steady at 30.5% of viewing time, down less than one percent as compared to Q2 2021 with Amazon Fire TV coming in second with 16% of big screen viewing time.

Samsung TV (13.7%), Android TV (7.8%) and LG TV (7.3%) rounded out the top five devices for big screen viewing time. Chromecast, Xbox and PlayStation all saw a decrease in share as compared to the previous year.

Android vs iPhone
To date, Conviva said the iPhone has been the primary device for mobile streaming, especially in North America.

In Q2 2022, the gap closed, with iPhone and Android phones capturing nearly identical global market share, 35.8% vs 33.2% respectively.

Android phones also outpaced the iPhone by 10% in YoY growth in streaming viewing hours.

But Apple’s advantage is its quality; it beats Android phones in every quality category.

As streaming publishers expand into newer, less mature streaming markets outside of North America, optimising the streaming experience for the Android mobile device market will be of increasing importance.

This first appeared in the subscription newsletter CommsWire on 13 September 2022.