NEW YORK—Despite the boost provided by massive viewing of the Super Bowl on Feb. 9, a new report from Nielsen’s The Gauge shows that streaming increased its share of total TV viewing to a record 43.% in February. That propelled streaming to less than one share point away from the 44.4% share of viewing held by traditional broadcast and cable TV.
Super Bowl Sunday typically ranks as one of the most heavily viewed days of television each year, and this year’s Super Bowl Sunday, February 9, tracked with historic trends as TV viewing across the day exceeded 110 billion viewing minutes, the report noted. This total day viewership milestone has been reached just one other time since The Gauge launched in May 2021, with Super Bowl Sunday on February 11, 2024, leading by a relatively slim margin of about 500 million minutes.
A record-breaking 127.7 million viewers watched Fox’s broadcast of Super Bowl LIX, including a simulcast streamed on Tubi, Fox’s free streaming service. That further illustrated how cross-platform distribution has materialized into real world success, Nielsen’s The Gauge reported.
While previous Super Bowls have offered alternative streaming options, Tubi’s free platform provided a way for the Big Game to reach even more viewers that usual, the researchers explained.
As the game aired live, Tubi represented a third of all streaming usage and multiplied its audience to nearly 16 times its January 2025 average. Viewers that watched Tubi during the Super Bowl were 38% more likely to be 18-34 than the total game average, and also skewed slightly female. Overall, Tubi’s February usage was up 17% over January to finish with 2.0% of total TV watch-time, its largest share since July 2024.
Following typical seasonal trends, time spent watching television decreased from January to February. Streaming was least impacted, however, and the category gained 0.9 share points versus January to account for 43.5% of total viewing time this month, marking its largest share of the TV viewership pie to date. By comparison, broadcast (21.2%) and cable (23.2%) combined to account for 44.4% of TV in February, the report explained.
Time spent watching YouTube on TV in February was up 2.5% versus last month to represent 11.6% of total TV viewing—a record for YouTube and the streaming category overall. Additionally, nearly 27% of time spent streaming in February was dedicated to watching YouTube., the researchers noted.
Following its platform-best performance achieved last month, Netflix represented the second largest share among streaming services in February with 8.2% of TV. Netflix also owned the top streaming program in February with its original action-thriller series The Night Agent, which captured 6 billion viewing minutes across the month. Bluey on Disney+ was second with 4.2 billion minutes., the report found.
Among cable viewing, the championship game in the inaugural NHL 4 Nations Face-Off drew this month’s largest cable audience, with 9.3 million viewers on ESPN. Fox News Channel represented the next 13 top cable telecasts, as cable news gained 8% over January to represent 27% of all cable viewing in February.
On broadcast, the Super Bowl and its pregame and postgame programs on Fox were followed by NBC’s Saturday Night Live 50th Anniversary Special with 16.5 million viewers, and The Grammys on CBS with 16.2 million viewers. Broadcast dramas, which accounted for the largest share of broadcast viewing in February (27%), were up 15% versus last month and led by CBS’ Tracker (10.6 million) and Matlock (9.4 million).
Last month’s post-season success for the NFL and College Football Playoffs meant an even steeper decline for traditional TV viewing in February. This was most obvious among sports events viewership, which fell 54% on broadcast and 42% on cable versus January. Despite strong showings by the Super Bowl and aforementioned top telecasts, total broadcast fell by 10% to account for 21.2% of TV (-1.3 pts.). Meanwhile, cable declined 9% and totaled 23.2% of TV (-1.2 pts.).
The February 2025 interval dates included 01/27/2025 through 02/23/2025. Nielsen reporting follows the broadcast calendar with measurement weeks that run Monday through Sunday.
