Television Viewing Round-Up – January 2006

All terrestrial broadcasters, other than Channel 4, lost viewing share during January 2006, with ITV1 faring worst, whilst multichannel viewing increased year on year.

In digital homes, however, Channel 4 grew its audience by 1.2% points, whilst ITV fell slightly on January 2005.

ITV1 had a bad start to the year, as it saw its viewing share fall by 1.8% points in January year on year. In addition, reports in the weekend’s papers claim that ITV1 is expected to reveal its weakest results for over ten years, with advertising revenue in Q1 2006 forecast to suffer a year on year drop of 13.5%, to £351.8 million (see ITV To Suffer Worst Q1 Results For Over A Decade).

BBC1, BBC2 and Five also suffered drops in viewing share, with BBC1 losing 0.8% points on the same period last year.

Channel 4 was the only terrestrial broadcaster to improve on last year’s performance, by adding 0.6% points, delivering a healthy 11.1% share of viewing. Celebrity Big Brother proved a big ratings winner for the broadcaster during January, with 6.4 million individuals tuning in to the finale to see non-celebrity Chantelle crowned the programme’s victor (see Friday Final Sees Strongest Ever Celeb Big Brother).

Multichannel viewing continued to rise year on year, with a 2.7% point rise, giving a share of 31.3%.

January saw little change in viewing share year on year for most terrestrial broadcasters in digital homes. ITV1 and Five both lost small amounts of share, 0.3% points and 0.4% points respectively, whilst BBC1 remained stable at nearly 19% share of viewing.

Channel 4 was the only exception, which added 1.2% points, fuelled by strong viewing for Celebrity Big Brother.

Multichannel viewing remains dominant in digital homes, due to the large channel choice it offers. Share has dropped 0.8% points on January 2005, but still takes up 41.6% of all viewing in digital homes.

BBC1 was the most popular terrestrial channel in both Sky and Freeview homes during January. It marginally edged ITV1 in Sky homes by 0.4% points, and comfortably won the crown in Freeview homes with a 24.9% share, beating ITV1 by 2.7% points.

Multichannel remained the most popular channel option in both Freeview and Sky homes. Viewing share of these digital channels is 51.4% in Sky homes and 22.5% in Freeview homes, with the difference due to the smaller channel choice available on Freeview.

BARB: www.barb.co.uk