Online video viewing will for the average person reach 100 minutes a day in 2021.
According to Zenith’s Online Video Forecasts 2019 report, this will be up from 84 minutes this year and be the equivalent of watching 25 continuous days of video in 2021.
The report notes that China and Sweden have the keenest online video viewers, with the average person in each country expected to spend 103 minutes a day watching online video this year. These are the only countries where online video viewing exceeds 100 minutes a day, but by 2021, Zenith expects Canada, India, Mexico, the UK and the USA to join the list.
According to Jonathan Barnard, head of forecasting at Zenith, “the consumption of online video is growing rapidly, and the average person will spend half as much time viewing online video as they spend viewing conventional television this year.
“This fast-expanding supply of audiences is fuelling rapid growth in demand from advertisers, making online video the fastest-growing digital channel by advertising expenditure.”
Zenith also forecasts that ad expenditure on online video will rise from $45 billion this year to $61 billion by 2021, at an average rate of 18% a year, compared to 10% a year for internet advertising as a whole. Meanwhile TV ad spend will shrink from $183 billion to $180 billion over the same period, as ratings continue to drop in key markets. Online video will therefore rise to the equivalent of a third of the entire TV market in 2021, up from a quarter this year.
Zenith also notes that video inventory is in high demand, and to meet the need, publishers have supplemented video ads that appear before, during or after video content with in-stream ads – video ads that pop up beside other content, such as text, images or social media posts – and out- stream or ‘in-read’ ads. Out-stream ads are now common and, in some markets, comprise the majority of video advertising: in the UK, 57% of video ad spend went to out-stream advertising in 2018. The balance may soon start to shift back towards in-stream advertising, though, as social platforms invest in their mobile TV products, such as Snapchat’s Shows.
Zenith argues that brands need to make clear distinctions between the way they use in-stream and out-stream ads. In-stream ads reach consumers who are actively seeking to view video, and are leaning forward to pay attention to it.
Out-stream ads reach consumers who are primarily interested in the content that the ads sit alongside, and who can quickly and easily scroll past them. These ads are commonly viewed with the sound off.
Looking beyond in-stream and out-stream, social platforms like Facebook and Snapchat are making Augmented Reality (AR) accessible to both consumers and brands through their AR video ads.
