Women’s sport is helping to fuel growth in video-on-demand subscriptions across Europe, with new research pointing to a widening gap with the United States and fresh pressure on Amazon’s Prime Video ad proposition.
According to Worldpanel by Numerator’s latest Entertainment on Demand report for Q3 2025, 60% of sports viewers in Great Britain watched women’s matches between July and September, rising to 64% in France. In the United States, the figure was 39% over the past month.
The success of England’s Lionesses and Red Roses, coupled with the growing appeal of French women’s competitions, is feeding directly into streaming gains. In France, the new Ligue1+ service – carrying top-flight football – secured 47% of all new paid sign-ups in the quarter.
“One in five new subscriptions this quarter were driven by sports alone, and women’s sports are increasingly important in this mix,” said Dominic Sunnebo, Commercial Director at Worldpanel by Numerator. “They’re both unearthing new viewers and bringing a variety of unforgettable sporting moments to our TV screens. Major players are rightly moving quickly to secure TV rights and ride this momentum in the hope that it may boost subscriber numbers.”
Globally, Amazon Prime Video retained the top spot for new paid streaming sign-ups in Q3 2025, capturing just over 13% of additions, with Netflix and Paramount+ close behind on just under 13%. Netflix’s share of new paid additions rose from 10% to 13% year-on-year, while Prime Video’s fell from 15% to 13%.
Ad-supported tiers continue to build, accounting for 31% of new subscriptions worldwide, up from 30% a year earlier. Adoption remains flat in the United States, but markets including Great Britain, Germany, Spain and Australia recorded solid growth in ad-funded plans.
Netflix claimed the two most-watched streaming titles of the quarter, with season 2 of Wednesday topping both “most watched” and “most enjoyed” lists, and season 3 of Squid Game also performing strongly. Prime Video, meanwhile, made inroads with younger 16–24 female viewers via The Summer I Turned Pretty, a demographic where the service has historically struggled.
With ad tiers expanding, the quality of the advertising experience is becoming a key competitive battleground. Worldpanel by Numerator’s data indicates that Prime Video trails competitors such as Warner Bros Discovery, Netflix and Disney+ across core ad-experience metrics including relevance, variation and the perceived number of ads shown.
The gap is significant with a 17-point shortfall on both relevance and variation, and 13 points on satisfaction with ad volume. Lower scores in these areas are linked to higher churn, with Prime Video’s quarterly churn rate rising from 5.7% to 6.5% year-on-year.
“As the service provider with the largest number of ad-supported subscribers, the ad experience is particularly important for Prime Video,” added Sunnebo. “The platform’s decision to auto-enrol ad-free customers into its ad-supported tier unless they opt out has made ad quality more critical than ever.”
