Providing Market Intelligence for 40 Years

In The News

Roku OS Missing Features Explained: Discovery and Developer Limits

Roku's market position has a way of making the platform look more capable than it is. Across U.S. broadband households, Roku OS accounts for 28% of connected TV platform usage, ahead of Samsung Tizen at 23%, with Amazon Fire TV, LG webOS, and Vizio SmartCast trailing at a distance, according to Parks Associates research.    

Parks Associates Director Michael Goodman puts the stakes plainly: operating systems determine what content consumers see, how services are positioned, and how advertising is delivered. With AI-driven search and  personalization becoming the new competitive standard for TV operating systems, the firm argues that platform control will only matter more in the years ahead. This is the context in which Roku's specific shortcomings land.           

What they may not yet prove is that Roku has closed the gap on the deeper AI-driven discovery layer Parks Associates identifies as the next competitive frontier. The firm argues that AI-driven personalization, the kind that doesn't just catalog content but anticipates it, is where platform competition is heading. Roku's What to Watch feature aggregates titles across services, which is useful.

Roku's 28% share is stable and its value proposition is real. According to Parks Associates, the platform earns its position for a wide range of users, particularly those who primarily want free content, simple setup, and a reliable experience without active management. Nothing in this analysis changes that.

Parks Associates projects that AI-driven personalization will become the standard competitive axis for TV operating systems in the coming years, with platform ecosystems growing more consequential as that shift plays out.

From the Cord-Cutters.gadgethacks article, "Roku vs other smart TV platforms: default choice versus deliberate choice

Previously In The News

Smart Home Owners Skew Younger, But Older Households Buy More Devices

Younger households adopt smart-home devices at a higher rate than older households, but older households with smart-home devices own more devices on average, Parks Associates found in a survey. Sma...

Cutting the Cord: Next year will bring even more streaming options

Amazon and Hulu, which has joined Netflix and Amazon as a creator of its own original content, will retain their solid spots as Nos. 2 and 3 in streaming subscriptions. The top three services have "to...

Cutting the Cord: What won't happen in 2016

Parks Associates research analyst Glenn Hower is prepared to be proved wrong, but he remains skeptical about an Apple streaming entry. "With Sling TV and PlayStation Vue in the market, Apple is now pl...

Everybody’s Doing It: How People Use Their Smartphones

Smartphones owners can’t keep their content on their phone, a Parks Associates survey of broadband households found. Thirty-five percent of smartphone owners stream music to speakers, and 24 percen...