Freeview Continues To Boost UK Digital Up-Take
Freeview saw uptake rise by more than 18% in the first quarter of this year in a development that helped to push digital television penetration to around 53% of all UK households.
The latest figures from Ofcom show that around 3.5 million households received the free-to-air digital terrestrial service in the first three months of this year, up from just over 3 million in the previous quarter.
According to the media super-regulator’s new Digital Television Update, the runaway success of Freeview helped push the total number of UK households with digital access to just over 13 million, an increase of 710,000 since the end of last year.
This overall figure includes Freeview’s 3.5 million digital terrestrial customers, BSkyB’s 7 million paying satellite subscribers, 2.3 million digital cable viewers and around 211,000 homes that receive free-to-air digital satellite television.
A further 4% of British households subscribe to analogue cable television, which brings the total number of homes receiving multi-channel services to almost 57%. This suggests the Government is making good progress towards its target of switching off the analogue signal by the end of this decade (see Digital Television Tops 10 Million Homes For First Time).
However, Culture Secretary, Tessa Jowell, wants to wait until 90% of the country has digital television before switching off the analogue signal, and research suggests the Government still has a long way to go in persuading the hardcore of digital refuseniks to make the change (see Government Faces Backlash Against Analogue Switch-Off).
The multi-channel market received a boost earlier this year with the launch of Top Up TV, a new pay-television service offering Freeview customers a range of ten additional channels. Last month it was revealed that the service had signed up 20,000 subscribers in its first month (see Boost For Top Up TV As Subscriber Figures Revealed).
Ofcom: 020 7981 3000 www.ofcom.org.uk
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