You don’t have to worry about missing your favorite television shows anymore, as you’re likely to find them online within days after they air. New statistics from online video search site Clicker say that half of all TV episodes make their way online within a day after their original air date, and nearly all episodes are available within a 2-week window following their original air date. Get the lowdown on these statistics and more after the jump.
Clicker recently released results of a survey designed to discover how much network programming actually ended up on the web during the last television season. Results were based upon television shows on ABC, CBS, FOX, NBC and CW shows that were released during this past Fall and Spring seasons. The results showed that a whopping 90% of all shows that aired during this past television season winded up online at one point or another.
As you can see from the chart above, 50% of episodes became available online within a single day after the TV air date. By the sixth day after air, 90% of the television episodes were available online. However, once the episodes became available they didn’t always stay for long. As you can see from the chart below, nearly all of the episodes were taken offline within six weeks after the air date. This is not surprising, as many network websites, as well as sites like Hulu, only share a selection of recent episodes with viewers. Once new episodes are released, old episodes are taken offline to make room for them.
Clicker also included data about shows made available online by specific network. The statistics showed that The CW had the highest percentage of shows online, at 100%, though they also had the smallest number of shows on television. ABC, FOX and NBC each offered a little over 90% of their shows online, and CBS offered about 88% of their shows. These statistics were based on a total of 4,420 full-episodes from 127 different shows across all networks.
Of the shows that were made available online, the largest percentage was made up of shows that aired during Primetime, at 84%. Daytime shows accounted for 10%, and Late Night shows a mere 6%. However, Daytime and Late Night shows made up for these small percentages in the episodes department, with Daytime shows accounting for 41% of online episodes and Late Night shows accounting for 20%. This is due largely to the fact that Daytime and Late Night shows air daily, so there are a lot more episodes. I’ll also go out on a limb and say that the fact that the same Daytime and Late Night shows air each week means that there is a smaller selection when it comes to these shows, accounting for the lower percentages in shows available online.
So which shows weren’t made available online? Clicker released the following list of shows that never made it onto the web:
ABC: Wife Swap, Romantically Challenged, America’s Funniest Home Videos (although the videos themselves are available)
CBS: The Mentalist, Criminal Minds, Cold Case, The Big Bang Theory
NBC: Law & Order, Law & Order SVU
FOX: American Idol, So You Think You Can Dance
Statistics from SideReel that we published last month showed that shows like American Idol and So You Think You Can Dance weren’t very popular on the Web in any case, as they are sort of “old news” by the time they are posted. So that may account for the reason why FOX is not currently putting these shows online.
So what can we take away from all of this? Clicker provides a good analysis along with their results:
“If this data indicates anything, it’s that when it comes to network TV online, what goes up must come down. If you want to catch a show, the sooner you get to it after its initial air date, the better. If you wait too long, the only likely alternative will be going through a paid service.”
As for the future of online video and television on the web, it seems we have a ways to go before we are all getting online to get our television fix for free. However, the very fact that these television shows are available for only a brief window for free is giving online viewers a taste of what it’s like to watch our favorite shows online. As more and more paid online video services with television episodes, such as Hulu Plus, pop up and we have more of a taste for online video content, will we be more likely to start paying? What’s your take on the matter?
