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Consumer Electronics and Entertainment

Q3 2026

Quantified Consumer

The New Live TV Model: Skinny Bundles, Sports, News

Live content remains essential in the streaming age, particularly for sports, news, and event programming. This study explores shifting preferences for live TV delivery, including vMVPDs, direct-to-consumer services, and hybrid bundles. It measures adoption, satisfaction, churn, and willingness to pay for live content. The research tracks key demographic trends and tests consumer sentiment on package size, content exclusivity, and sports fragmentation.

Key questions addressed:
  1. How are U.S. households accessing live TV today, and how is this changing over time?
  2. What role does live content, especially sports, news, and live events, play in household viewing habits?
  3. How satisfied are consumers with their current live TV services, and which providers are winning or losing loyalty?
  4. What drives churn, switching, and return behavior in the live TV market?
  5. Which incentives are most effective at retaining or re-acquiring live TV subscribers?
  6. How appealing are skinny bundles and alternative packaging models compared with traditional pay TV?
  7. How do preferences for live TV models vary by demographics, provider, and household characteristics?

 

Purchase

Video Services Ecosystem

Executive Summary

Penetration of Pay TV vs. SVOD Services

Traditional Pay-TV Service Provider Market Share

Traditional Pay-TV Churn: Cord-Cutter vs. Cord-Never by Age

Reasons for Cancelling Traditional Pay-TV Services

Pay-TV Subscription: Cancelled in the Past & Returned

Reasons for Subscribing to Pay-TV Service

Frequency of Watching Live Programming

Skinny Bundle Appeal, All Respondents

Reasons Skinny Bundle is Appealing

Ideal Video Service Packages

Interest in Paying for a Flexible, Short-Term Content Access Pass

Competitive Landscape

Penetration of Pay TV vs. SVOD Services

Video Service Subscription Market View: Subscribing HHs vs. US Internet HHs

Traditional Pay-TV Service Provider Market Share, YoY

vMVPD Provider Market Share, YoY

Trends in Adoption of Top 15 SVOD Services

Net Promoter Score of Traditional Pay-TV Service: Trending

Net Promoter Score of vMVPD Service: Trending

Net Promoter Score of Leading SVOD Services

Churn

Traditional Pay-TV Churn: Cord-Cutter vs. Cord-Never

Traditional Pay-TV Churn: Cord-Cutter vs. Cord-Never by Age

Reasons for Cancelling Traditional Pay-TV Services

Pay-TV Subscription: Cancelled in the Past & Returned

Current Video Service, by Returning Pay-TV Subscribers

Reasons for Subscribing to Pay-TV Service

Incentives to Re-Subscribe to Pay-TV Service

Reasons for Subscribing to Pay-TV Service

Annualized Churn Rates, by vMVPD Service

Reasons for Cancelling vMPVD Services

The Value of Live Content

Types of Video Content Typically Watched

Methods of Accessing Live Video Content

Method of Accessing Live Video, by Video Service

Frequency of Watching Live Programming

Watch Live Programs Daily, by Video Service

Issues Experienced when Watching Sports Content

Skinny Bundles: Concept Testing

Skinny Bundle Appeal, All Respondents

Skinny Bundle Appeal, by Video Service Subscribers

Skinny Bundle Appeal, by Traditional Pay-TV Provider

Skinny Bundle Appeal, by Current vMVPD Providers

Skinny Bundle Appeal, by Number of SVOD Subscriptions

Interest in Switching to a Skinny Bundle among All Pay-TV Subscribers

Interest in Switching to a Skinny Bundle by Current Mode of Accessing Live Video

Reasons Skinny Bundle is Appealing

Preferred Channels Included in a Skinny Bundle

Profile of Target Skinny Bundle Subscriber

Average Monthly Price Willing to Pay for a Skinny Bundle

Next-Generation Bundle Testing

Ideal Video Service Packages

Ideal Video Service Packages by Top Traditional Pay-TV Providers

Ideal Video Service Packages by vMVPD Providers

Bundle Loyalist

Hybrid Optimizer

Streaming Simplifiers

Legacy Holdout

Short-Term Pass: Concept Testing

Interest in Paying for a Flexible, Short-Term Pass of Content Access

High Interest in Paying for a Flexible, Short-Term Pass, by TVOD Users

High Interest in Paying for a Flexible, Short-Term Pass, by Content Genre

Sports Viewers High Interest in Paying for a Flexible, Short-Term Pass, by Live Event

Premium Channel Pass

Series Pass

Live Event Pass

Genre Pass

Franchise Pass

Appendix