Indiana Pacers’ Andrew Nembhardt (2) guards Boston Celtics’ Jaylen Brown during Game 2 of the 2024 NBA Eastern Conference Finals.
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Disney is the top media company responsible for the largest share of TV viewing in May.
According to Nielsen’s second Media Distributor Gauge, it looks at how TV usage is stacked by company. Disney’s 11.4 percent of TV usage in May included viewing of ABC, ESPN, FX, Hulu, Disney+ and other cable and streaming properties under the Mouse umbrella. Disney’s share of TV usage was consistent with April’s 11.5 percent — part of the first publicly released distributor rankings — and six months of data compiled by Nielsen before going public with the numbers.
Several live sports broadcasts, including the NBA playoffs on ESPN, and multiple season finales on ABC helped keep Disney at the top of the list for the month.
YouTube was second in May with 9.7 percent of TV usage, and its April showing was in line with 9.6 percent. NBCUniversal (9 percent), Paramount (8.8 percent) and Warner Bros. Discovery (8.1 percent) rounded out the top five, with Netflix (7.6 percent) not far behind. As noted in Nielsen’s other gauge rankings for May, YouTube and Netflix are the biggest. Individual streaming sites by a wide margin.
All 14 distributors in May’s rankings are the same as those who made the list in April, and 13 of them saw little or no change in their share. The exception was Fox, which added 0.3 points to its share to rise to 6.4 percent of TV usage. The increase was driven by a 5 percent increase in viewing of Fox’s fast service Tubi (1.8 percent used TV for the month) and an increase in Fox News viewing. Another fast-growing platform, Roku Channel, has 1.5 percent usage, joining Weigel Broadcasting (which distributes retro channel MeTV).
The 14 companies that reached 1 percent of Nielsen’s total TV usage accounted for three-quarters (72.7 percent) of TV usage for the month. Below is the media distributor rankings for the month of May.