Time to get outside? The average person will spend 100 minutes each day watching online video in 2021, up from 84 minutes this year, according to a new report from Zenith.
The figure, taken from the agency’s fifth Online Video Forecasts report, is the equivalent of watching 25 continuous days of video in 2021.
“The consumption of online video is growing rapidly, and the average person will spend half as much time viewing online video as they spend viewing conventional television this year,” said Jonathan Barnard, head of forecasting at Zenith.
“This fast-expanding supply of audiences is fuelling rapid growth in demand from advertisers, making online video the fastest-growing digital channel by advertising expenditure.”
The amount of time people spend viewing online video has been growing rapidly across the globe, at an average rate of 32% a year between 2013 and 2018, boosted by improvements in display sizes and quality of mobile devices, faster mobile data connections, and the spread of connected TV sets.
China and Sweden have the keenest online video viewers, with the average person in each country expected to spend 103 minutes a day watching online video this year. These are the only countries where online video viewing exceeds 100 minutes a day, but by 2021, Zenith expects Canada, India, Mexico, the UK and the USA to join the list.
Zenith also forecasts that advertising expenditure on online video will rise from US$45bn this year to US$61bn by 2021, at an average rate of 18% a year, compared to 10% a year for internet advertising as a whole.
Meanwhile, Zenith said television adspend will shrink from US$183bn to US$180bn over the same period.
