Pure Telecom survey reveals Irish annual streaming spend is €1.1BN, down from €1.3BN last year

Pure Telecom, Ireland’s high-speed broadband and telecoms provider, have announced the results from its annual Connected Lives survey, which found that the annual spend on video streaming services by consumers in Ireland is €1.1BN, down €200M since last year. This is despite the fact that video streaming has grown in popularity over the last year.

The nationally representative survey of 1,006 adults in Ireland was conducted by Censuswide on behalf of Pure Telecom. The research shows that while almost the entire population of adults in Ireland (96%, versus 94% last year) are streaming video content, there has been a rise in the proportion of adults who do not pay for a subscription. Additionally, the average number of subscriptions per adult has dropped.

Pure Telecom’s survey found that 37% of adults have cancelled one or more video streaming subscriptions in the last 12 months. Of these, 45% said they did so because of costs and 28% said the content wasn’t good enough. One-in-five cancelled in favour of another service and the same proportion said they cancelled because the free or discounted period had elapsed.

The research revealed that now, 22% of adults in Ireland do not have a paid video streaming subscription, a significant increase on the 6% who said this last year. Meanwhile, the average number of video streaming subscriptions per adult has gone from 2.4 last year to 1.5 this year.

Pure Telecom’s research also delved into password-sharing, whereby people use the login details of friends or family outside of their household to access streaming services. The survey found that almost 615,000 adults in Ireland are using someone else’s password to stream video content without them, or the account holder, paying for it. This is despite the fact that almost 400,000 of these are availing of streaming services that have a policy of charging extra for password-sharing.

Paul Connell, CEO, Pure Telecom, said: “Our expectation for this research was that we would find, yet again, that the streaming spend in Ireland had risen. Instead, we found that as we approach 100% of the population using streaming services, people are getting more frugal about which services, and how many, they are willing to pay for.

“As always, consumers want the best value for their money. Given the extensive choice of streaming channels available to them, they will only pay for what they deem to be the very best. At Pure Telecom, we are committed to ensuring they get this quality of service from their broadband provider, too; enabling the population to watch their favourite shows with the fastest speeds and best prices.”

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