Welcome to the latest edition of State of the Screens.  

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Onward,

Michael Beach

Every Person in Your House Has 3 TV Screens

When I was thirteen, my must-see TV wasn’t on demand.

It came once a week, after dinner, with my family gathered on the couch.

That show was Home Improvement.

Tim Taylor blew up power tools. Jill rolled her eyes. Wilson offered wisdom over the fence. And of course, there was Heidi…

It was funny, familiar, and full of life lessons that somehow stuck.

Back then, you didn’t choose what to watch. You chose when to gather.

Today, we can stream anything, anytime. But somewhere along the way, we stopped watching together.

Maybe that’s what we’ve lost in the streaming era: the home in Home Improvement.

I have been thinking about this a lot as my oldest (Tween Screens) is two weeks away from becoming Teen Screens.

For her, fragmentation isn’t a crisis. It’s all she’s ever known.

For us, losing the mass audience feels like a problem.

For her, it’s just personalized content.

Let’s break it down into 3 big questions:
1) How do we receive TV?
2) What does TV reach look like?
3) Why is reach declining for linear TV?

This is part two of my Streaming Decade in Four Steps series.
1) Red Pill or Blue Pill? (Overview)
2) Every Person in Your House Has 3 TV Screens (Reach)

How do we receive TV?

U.S. TV households (Activate):
1) Pay-TV - 64M (48%)
2) Broadband only - 45M (34%)
3) Over-the-air - 15M (11%)
4) No TV - 8M (6%)

Why this matters: Most linear viewing still happens through pay-TV bundles. Antenna use is flat. Broadband-only homes are growing fast.

Over-the-air households:
1) 2022 - 15M
2) 2023 - 15M  (↑ 0%)
3) 2024 - 15M  (↑ 0%)

Broadband-only households:
1) 2022 - 36M
2) 2023 - 41M  (↑ 14%)
3) 2024 - 45M  (↑ 10%)

What does TV reach look like?

Streaming surpassed linear TV for reach in 2023—two years earlier than I predicted.

Reach (2025-2035):
1) Linear TV - 61% → 48% (↓ 22%)
2) Streaming TV - 69% → 78% (↑ 12%)

Why is reach declining for linear TV?

We’ve gone from a world with more people than TV screens to a world with more screens than people.

How this happened:  When I was 13, we had two TVs - one in the kitchen for the news, one in the family room for movies/shows. Now, we have more full-size TVs than people, plus iPads, phones, laptops, and game consoles.

Why this matters:  Everyone watches what entertains them. Linear TV was built for mass delivery. Streaming is built for personal delivery. Algo TV is the future.

Where linear TV lost the war: Soon, broadband-only homes will outnumber pay-TV subscribers. If linear TV had built a product for them, this wouldn’t matter. But streaming companies did, and they won the audience.