2021 France Consumer Insights survey: France no longer lags in SVOD adoption

Introduction

Due to the increased use of online video services during the height of the pandemic in 2020 and continued subscriber expansion in 2021, the adoption of online subscription video services in France is now on par with other Western European countries.

* Subscription video-on-demand adoption in France continued to expand in 2021, with 78% of internet households subscribing to at least one online subscription video service — up 5 percentage points from 2020.

* Growth in SVOD use is primarily from new households subscribing for the first time.

* Survey data shows that the average hours spent on digital entertainment returned to pre-pandemic levels during 2021.

* The survey also documents a shift away from live TV to more VOD viewing, with limited SVOD stacking.

The surveys show that Netflix Inc. has been the primary beneficiary of this SVOD growth trend. The use of Netflix among surveyed internet adults has risen from 43% in 2019 to 63% at year-end 2021. Amazon.com Inc.'s Prime Video experienced modest growth over this time, increasing 7 percentage points over the past two years to 29% in 2021. The CANAL+ Group Canal+ Series service had a slight bump in usage during 2020 (up 3 percentage points over 2019) but receded back to pre-pandemic levels in 2021 (12%). Walt Disney Co.'s Disney+ also showed a slight 3 percentage point decline year over year to 19%, though this variance is within the survey's statistical margin of error.

Results from the Kagan 2021 France Consumer Insights survey as well as historical surveys show that the use of online SVOD services grew 11 percentage points during 2020, presumably due to pandemic-related lockdowns and office closures that forced consumers to spend more time at home. Unlike in the U.K., where overall SVOD adoption was flat (82%) during 2021, the use of SVOD services in France continued growing, up another 5 percentage points to 78%.

On average, French internet adults used 1.7 SVOD services in 2021, unchanged from the year before. This reflects that growth of the overall SVOD market has largely come from new households adopting SVOD for the first time, rather than existing SVOD households adding more subscriptions (aka, SVOD stacking).

As more French internet adults adopt SVOD services, the amount of time they spend watching VOD is growing. For example, in 2019, nearly half (45%) of survey respondents said they watched primarily live TV, while only 24% indicated they spent half or more of their TV viewing time watching VOD. Two years later, those watching primarily live TV have dropped to 37% and nearly one-third (31%) spend 50% or more of their TV viewing time watching VOD.

The increase in VOD viewing can also be seen in the rise of mobile video viewing over the past four years. At year-end 2021, 71% of surveyed internet adults in France reported viewing video on their smartphone or tablet inside the home, and 63% viewed mobile video outside the home. Over one-third (36%) indicated they view mobile video away from home at least once a week (aka, frequent viewer), up 7 percentage points since 2018. Nearly half (46%) of surveyed internet adults in 2021 said they frequently watch mobile video in the home, an increase of 12 percentage points over the past four years.

Historical survey data illustrates how overall daily consumption of digital entertainment rose from an average of 6.1 hours per day in 2019 to 7.0 hours per day in 2020. However, in 2021, daily consumption of digital entertainment reverted back to the pre-pandemic average of 6.1 hours per day. Over the past three years, average TV/video daily viewing hours remained essentially flat, just over three hours per day on average. In contrast, time spent playing video games and listening to music increased substantially during the pandemic, returning to slightly above pre-pandemic levels in 2021.

This suggests that the growth of SVOD services and multichannel TV subscriptions in France reflect a realignment of where consumers get their TV/video entertainment, rather than changes in TV viewing behavior.

Finally, it should be noted that cinema attendance, which declined to 50% during 2020 rebounded strongly in 2021 to 68%, though still below traditional historical levels. The survey data also shows that activities such as video disc rentals, online video rentals, online gaming and mobile gaming were all largely immune to the effects of the COVID-19 virus, remaining fairly consistent over the past four years.

^{The 2021 Kagan European Consumer Insights surveys were conducted during December 2021 with approximately 1,000 internet adults per country in the U.K., France, Germany, Italy, Sweden and Poland. Each survey has a margin of error of +/-3 percentage points at the 95% confidence level. Percentages are rounded up to the nearest whole number. Survey data should only be used to identify general market characteristics and directional trends.}

^{Consumer Insights is a regular feature from Kagan, a media research group within S&P Global Market Intelligence's TMT offering, providing exclusive research and commentary.}

^{This article was published by S&P Global Market Intelligence and not by S&P Global Ratings, which is a separately managed division of S&P Global.}