Consumers spend 250mn hours on mobile video apps in 1Q21

The leading mobile data and analytics firm says that its data, principally showing that consumers are set to spend well over 1 trillion hours on video streaming apps on Android phones alone in 2021, as evidence for apps’ accessibility not being able to be beat, even if people’s commute was currently “from the bed to the desk to the couch.”

App Annie also found that in the first quarter of 2021, consumers spent over a quarter of a billion hours on video streaming apps alone — up 15% YoY and up 70% from 2 years prior. In Q1 2021 in the US, YouTube remained the market leader in time spent, followed by Netflix, Hulu, Twitch and Amazon Prime Video. App Annie noted that while TikTok was not a traditional streaming provider, it would rank second amongst video streaming providers. In Q1 alone, Americans spent nearly $770 million, a 25% increase compared with Q4 2020, through mobile on the top 20 video streaming providers, largely through in-app subscriptions.

Breaking out time spent watching video streaming in the quarter by platform, the data showed that the top ten for Android phones was YouTube, Netflix, Hulu, Twitch, Amazon Prime Video, Tubi TV, Disney+ (pictured) , Pluto.tv, Roku and YouTube Kids. The leading video streaming apps by consumer spend in the US in Q1 2021 were YouTube, Disney+, Twitch, HBO Max, Hulu, Netflix, Crunchyroll, STARZ, Paramount and Amazon Prime Video.

Other highlights in the study were that global consumer spend in Amazon Prime Video grew 180% year-on-year in Q1 2021 with the global average monthly active users of the service growing 35% annually. in Q1 2021. Cross app usage of Amazon Prime Video in April 2021 on iPhones in the US was: 65% cross-app usage with Netflix; 33% cross-app usage with Hulu; 28% cross-app usage with Disney+; 21% cross-app usage with HBO Max.

Globally, Netflix emerged as the leading breakout app by time spent in 2020 across key markets in Asia, LATAM, North America and Europe, while YouTube remained the runaway leader, except for China, for average monthly time spent per user — outpacing rivals by up to 6x.

“TikTok’s user overlap with top streaming apps grew dramatically in 2020, more than doubling in the US, and Twitch remained a top 5 competitor among more ‘traditional’ streaming rivals,” observed App Annie senior market insights manager Lexi Sydow. TikTok and Twitch pose a dramatic shift in consumption towards user-generated and mobile-focused; a shift traditional players and marketers alike need to bake into their mobile strategies.” Rapid TV News