Ooyala PC Smartphones Tablets TV Video

Screen size doesn’t matter: new study finds long-form video most popular content across all devices

June 30, 2017

If you think that small screens are solely for shorter videos, think again. For the first time ever, long-form video is the most popular content on all screens, large and small.

According to Ooyala’s latest video index report, long-form video consumption is up across the board, with smartphones seeing a jump from last year’s 47% to 55% during the first quarter of 2017. Computers were up from 55% to 65% and Smart TVs went up from 96% to 98%.

Tablets registered the most notable increase, with long-from video consumption going from 65% in 2016 to 81% this year.

Ooyala’s video report is based on data gathered from more than 500 customers which, according to the video analytics platform, represent hundreds of millions of online video viewers that span across nearly every country.

According to Ooyala, “The size of our company video and advertising footprint, along with the variety of our customers, results in a representative view of global consumption and engagement trends.”

From the report:

Smartphones finished the quarter with 46.95% of all plays – nearly equalling the total for all mobile devices last year. It was the highest total for smartphones since we began the Video Index, up nearly 20% year-over-year … Tablets, too, set a record globally, finishing the quarter with nearly 10% of all plays (9.6%).

The report also tracked publishers’ (news and media organisations) and broadcasters’ (companies distributing TV content) ad completion rates and ad impressions for both pre-roll and mid-roll video ads across devices.

“Broadcasters, with their abundance of premium content, have had enviable numbers as far as pre-roll ad completion in the past, and that didn’t change in Q1,” Ooyala added.

Broadcasters saw a 93% pre-roll completion rate on Smart TVs, 90% on PCs, 86% on tablets and 85% on smartphones. For mid-roll, completion rates were even stronger, with Smart TVs seeing 99% of ads completed, PCs at 97%, tablets at 94% and phones at 91%.

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Publishers didn’t have as much success — with connected TVs at 85% pre-roll ad completion rate, followed by PCs at 78%, smartphones at 76% and tablets at 71%. The findings rang true in regards to mid-roll ads, with PCs at 80% and smartphones at 54%.

Overall, although mobile plays were dominant in every region, Ooyala found an 11% variance in consumption between North American viewers and more active viewers in the Asia-Pacific (APAC) region.

Meanwhile, Europe, the Middle East, Africa (EMEA) and Latin America (LATAM) saw more than 10% year-over-year growth in mobile consumption.

Ooyala PC Smartphones Tablets TV Video