The new DPP European TV & Streaming Outlook, a research project conducted by the DPP in collaboration with Mediavision, explores how audiences from 11 European markets are consuming streaming services, social video, and linear TV — as well as how local services compare to US streamers and the Big Tech social and video platforms.

Highlights from the study were shared at the DPP European Broadcaster Summit 2026 in Paris, where the research was introduced by Principal Analyst at Mediavision, Fredrik Liljeqvist, who discussed some of the key findings with DPP Founder and Chief Content Officer Mark Harrison.

With the European media landscape undergoing such a profound reconfiguration, the European TV & Streaming Outlook is born from a research collaboration between the DPP and Sweden-based analyst partners Mediavision to investigate how viewing is distributed across platforms, how that translates into subscription and engagement patterns, and the extent to which local and international services are experiencing such different trajectories across the region.

As such the European TV & Streaming Outlook sets out to answer a set of increasingly urgent questions for European media and technology companies which existing market data could not adequately answer. Broadly, these are:

• How is daily viewing time actually split between traditional TV, online video/streaming, and social video?
• To what extent have online video services become truly daily‑reach platforms rather than occasional destinations?
• How is the balance of power shifting between local services and international players in terms of both reach and time spent watching?

Audiences across 11 European countries were surveyed, with the US also included as a benchmark, with the goal to present a comparative view of usage and engagement, rather than a series of isolated national narratives. [Contact us at the DPP for more granular data by country and streaming service.]

Linear, online and social: The new mix of viewing

The starting point for the DPP and Mediavision research was to gauge average daily viewing share across linear TV, online video, and social video. It is worth noting that a key methodological decision is the classification of YouTube as online video, rather than social video. This reflects its position as a primary online video destination and avoids conflating it with more socially oriented platforms.

Clearly the online transition is universal across Europe, although it is also immediately obvious that the continent is far from a single, homogenous market in terms of audience behaviours.

In Sweden, traditional TV viewing has already fallen to around 30% of daily viewing share, with the UK (33%) and Denmark (34%) not far behind.

But linear TV remains resilient in Italy, or it is at least hanging on, with more than half of daily viewing share.

Social video engagement ranges widely, from around 12% in countries such as Finland to roughly 20% in neighbouring markets like Sweden, and 19% in France.

Including the US is a useful benchmark or barometer for change, since it does look broadly as though Europe is following similar structural trends — particularly around the growth of streaming — but with different speeds and cultural dynamics in each territory.

Streaming as daily reach medium

One of the most striking findings is how far streaming has progressed from being an occasional complement to broadcast viewing, to becoming a daily‑reach medium. This is shown in the next chart, which presents the daily reach of online video and social video in 11 European markets and the US.

Streaming consumption is widespread across all markets in Europe, with online video services being used by 63-75% of the population on a daily basis.

It is worth noting that daily reach reflects the proportion of people engaging with these services every day, acting as a measure of penetration rather than engagement or even subscription ownership.

Indeed, high daily reach does not imply consistent usage patterns. In Italy, for instance, while the daily reach of online video platforms is relatively high, the total viewing time is comparatively low.

This suggests that in such markets, streaming is a widespread, light, or supplementary viewing habit rather than a source of deep, time-intensive engagement. Ultimately, however, digital audiences are pretty much universal across Europe, so market competition centres on the depth of engagement.

Major differences in SVOD, AVOD and FAST viewing

But there are major differences between markets, which can be seen in the daily reach of different types of online video services.

The following chart presents the markets from our cohort with the lowest and highest reach for SVOD, Ad tier SVOD, AVOD, FAST and public service broadcasting.

Differences between markets run much deeper than viewing share alone, from strong free consumption in Finland to robust ad tier markets in the UK and Spain, most closely following trends in the US.

The long tail of services – and US dominance

Once we accept that around two-thirds to three-quarters of Europeans are watching online video platforms every day, the real question becomes: which platforms are they watching?

The European TV & Streaming Outlook reveals a growing long tail of services competing for attention, presented below. But the competitive reality is stark.

YouTube and Netflix consistently occupy the top positions in most markets. And below them sits an expanding array of services, extending down through players like Amazon Prime Video, Disney+, HBO Max, Apple TV+ and a number of smaller or more niche offerings.

A handful of European entrants do make a visible impact, but they are the exception rather than the rule.

With social video platforms in the picture, presented in light red columns above, the competition for attention intensifies further. Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook all sit around the 20% daily usage mark. Snapchat is lower, but still reaches around 10% of the population daily.

Taken together, this paints a picture of an environment where US‑based media and technology companies are capturing a large share of European attention, both through streaming services and social platforms, while local services fight to retain relevance in their home markets.

Subscription stacking and the limits of growth

Beyond raw attention, the research also explores the economics of subscription behaviour, particularly SVOD stacking — the number of subscription video services a household or individual is willing to maintain.

The following chart plots the penetration of SVOD (the share of the population with at least one subscription) on the vertical Y-axis, against the average number of SVOD services per household (rather than per subscriber), on the horizontal X-axis.

Many European countries cluster up to around 80% penetration, meaning close to four in five people have at least one SVOD service. When individual subscribers are grouped in households, the average number of standalone and bundled SVOD services then hovers at around three.

Few households subscribe to significantly more than three services, suggesting a practical ceiling on subscription stacking in most markets.

But there are notable exceptions. In the UK and US, more homes (and indeed individuals) maintain a larger basket of services, including a wider mix of smaller and free offerings. Italy too stands out as an outlier, with high SVOD penetration despite TV still holding half of viewing time, but with fewer households holding multiple subscriptions.

Across much of Europe, therefore, anyone planning to launch 'just one more' paid streaming service will need to confront the reality that they are vying for limited wallet share and attention in already saturated households.

And extrapolating from the data, it could be anticipated that over time the total number of individual services will decline, and that aggregation services that simplify both access and subscription processes will gain in popularity.

Local services vs US streamers

Penetration alone, however, does not capture the full competitive landscape; what matters equally is the time spent consuming video services. The research therefore also breaks engagement down into minutes viewed, distinguishing between local online video services and US‑based online video services.

In the following breakdown, social video and YouTube are both excluded from the US streamers bucket. While this perhaps downplays US dominance, YouTube's nature as a platform hosting content from all over the world makes such distinctions complex, and excluding it allows for a more direct comparison between broadcaster‑led and studio‑led services.

The contrasts are revealing. In Finland, more than half of all online viewing minutes go to local services, demonstrating strong national affinity and the power of focused local offerings.

In Spain, by contrast, around four in every five minutes watching online video is spent with US services, not Spanish ones.

Part of this can be explained by strategic choices and investment patterns: for instance, significant investment in Spanish‑language content has made Netflix a powerful presence across the Spanish‑speaking world.

Meanwhile it might be anticipated that in the Nordics, where English is widely spoken, as well as in the UK of course, the US streamers would be exceptionally strong. But in reality local content in these countries remains relatively strong.

Market rankings: where local services stand

Finally, one of the most illuminating ways to view the data is to compare the top online video service overall in each country and the top locally owned online video service.

This ranking view exposes some stark national differences in the consumption of streaming services and online video. In Poland, Germany, France, Spain, Italy and the UK the leading local service ranks only fifth in the market, far behind the top international players. Local online video platforms have reasonable penetration, but their scale relative to global giants is modest.

In the Nordic countries, by contrast, local champions perform strongly. In Finland, the national broadcaster's Yle Areena streaming service ranks second overall, ahead of Netflix and beaten only by YouTube — and with a much smaller gap to the leading position compared to other markets.

Similar patterns are visible in nearby Nordic markets like Norway, where local platforms have carved out substantial positions. This Nordic cluster stands out for its strong local affinities and effective public and commercial local services, while southern and western Europe generally show weaker local performance and impressive market share for the big international platforms.

And when we look simply at which services lead in each country by attention, one name recurs almost everywhere: YouTube. While there are a few Netflix‑led markets, YouTube is frequently the single largest attention‑getter, reinforcing its central role in the new European video ecosystem.

DPP'S THREE KEY TAKEAWAYS

• The Universal Shift to Streaming and Decline of Linear TV
  The transition to online video is widespread across Europe, with online video services reaching 63–75% of the population daily, positioning streaming as a daily-reach medium. While this shift is universal, the pace of change is uneven; for instance, linear TV viewing has fallen to around 30% of daily share in countries like Sweden, but remains over 50% in Italy.
• US Dominance in the Attention Economy
  US-based media and technology companies are capturing a vast share of European attention, both through streaming platforms and social media. YouTube is often the single largest attention-getter in most markets, with YouTube and Netflix consistently occupying the top service rankings. Local online video platforms have modest scale relative to these global giants, though Nordic countries like Finland show strong performance by local champions.
  
  But it is worth noting that as an increasing proportion of the content available on both YouTube and Netflix is non-US in origin, the dominance of US media and tech companies is not necessarily the same thing as the dominance of US content.
• Subscription Stacking is Hitting a Ceiling
  SVOD penetration is high across much of Europe, clustering around 80% of the population having at least one subscription. However, the average number of SVOD services per household hovers around three, indicating a "practical ceiling on subscription stacking" in most markets. This suggests that new paid streaming services will struggle to gain market share as they vie for limited wallet space in already saturated households.