In January 2021, moneyland.ch conducted a representative online survey of the video and audio streaming habits of 1500 consumers in Switzerland. The survey was carried out by market research institute Ipsos on behalf of moneyland.ch, and the results were compared against the 2018 and 2020 moneyland.ch Swiss Streaming Surveys.
The results show that the use of streaming services in Switzerland has increased once again – including use of dominant service providers Netflix and Spotify. A high 89% of residents now use at least one of the 22 streaming services included in the survey.
Using streaming services has become an important leisure activity for residents of Switzerland. “The suspension of alternative leisure activities has resulted in video and audio streaming becoming even more popular since the start of the coronavirus crisis,” explains moneyland.ch telecom expert Ralf Beyeler.
Streaming services gain thanks to corona
The increasing popularity of streaming services in Switzerland is also visible in the number of users of individual streaming services (the percentage of the total population which uses a free or paid streaming service).
The biggest winner over the past year is streaming giant YouTube with a gain of 10 percentage points (75% of residents use YouTube compared to 65% in 2020). Netflix follows closely with a gain of 9 percentage points (54% compared to 45% a year ago). Other winners include Amazon Prime Video (10% up from 7%) and Sky Sport (6% up from 4%).
Audio streaming service Spotify is now used by 44% of residents compared to 35% a year ago. Other winners include SoundCloud (11% up from 8%), Apple Music (16% up from 15%) and Deezer (6% up from 5%).
YouTube remains the most popular streaming service
75% of residents now use YouTube – and huge increase of 10 percentage points compared to last year’s survey. The vast majority of YouTube consumers use the non-paid version. Only 4% of residents have a paid YouTube subscription.
Young adults are much more likely to use YouTube than older adults. 94% of residents aged 19 to 25 stream videos with YouTube, compared to 61% of adults aged 50 to 74.
Netflix dominates paid video streaming
Netflix has grown substantially in Switzerland over recent years. A high 54% of consumers – more than half of adult residents – now use Netflix. That is up from 45% a year ago and just 20% in April 2018. “The coronavirus crisis has been a major boon for Netflix’s customer acquisition in Switzerland,” believes Ralf Beyeler from moneyland.ch.
39% of residents now use paid Netflix subscriptions. That is, by a wide margin, the highest value for a paid streaming service in Switzerland.
15% of survey participants stated that they use Netflix without paying for a subscription. 12% use the Netflix accounts of friends or acquaintances.
Young adults are much more likely to use Netflix than older adults. 83% of adults between the ages of 18 and 25 use Netflix, compared to 62% of adults aged 25 to 49 and 33% of adults aged 50 to 74 years old.
Newcomer Disney+ has already overtaken Amazon Prime Video
It has been around one year since Disney+ launched in Switzerland. In January 2021 – approximately ten months after its launch – around 13% of residents already use Disney+, the moneyland.ch survey shows. That puts Disney+ in second place after Netflix among conventional streaming services, and ahead of Amazon Prime video (used by 10% of consumers).
TikTok is now a strong contender
Another relative newcomer is TikTok. The app which combines short videos with social media has quickly established itself among young consumers in Switzerland.
The survey shows that TikTok is most popular among young adults, with 35% of consumers between the ages of 18 and 25 using the app. That puts it in third place for consumers in this age group – after YouTube (94%) and Netflix (83%).
Across all age groups, a total of 13.3% of residents use TikTok.
YouTube for audio streaming
62% of participants stated that they use YouTube to listen to music. Most do not use the paid YouTube Music service, but make use of classic YouTube video streaming to listen to audio.
As with video streaming, age plays a significant role in audio streaming with YouTube. 79% of young adults between the ages of 18 and 25 use YouTube to listen to music, compared to 68% of adults aged 26 to 49 and 49% of adults aged 50 to 74 years old.
Spotify is the most popular paid audio streaming service
Recent years have seen Spotify gain significant traction in the Swiss market. This year’s survey shows that 44% of residents use Spotify, compared to 35% a year ago and 20% three years ago.
Spotify is especially popular among young adults. 78% of adults between the ages of 18 and 25 use Spotify, compared to 525 of adults aged 26 to 49 and 22% of adults aged 50 to 74.
Young adults more likely to stream and pay
89% of participants use at least one streaming service.
100% of participants in the 18-25-year-old age group use at least one streaming service. 96% of adults aged 26 to 49 use a streaming service, and 77% of adults aged 50 to 74 use at least one streaming audio or video streaming service.
Young adults are exceptionally willing to pay for streaming. 77% of participants between the ages of 18 and 25 pay for at least one streaming service, compared to 65% of adults aged 26 to 49 and 35% of adults aged 50 to 74.
More than half of residents pay for streaming
55% of participants pay for at least one streaming service. But there are huge differences between different streaming services.
Netflix has the most paying customers, with 39% of adult residents between the ages of 18 and 74 stating that they pay for Netflix subscriptions. Netflix is followed by Spotify (21%), Disney+ (8%), Apple Music (7%), Swisscom blue Max (6%) and Swisscom blue Sport (5%).
Sport streaming services are more widely used
The three main sports streaming services Sky Sports, DAZN and Swisscom blue Sport target sports enthusiasts with a broad palette of sports broadcasts. Swisscom made sports broadcasts from its blue pay TV channels (formerly Teleclub) available as for streaming in autumn 2020.
Compared to last year, there are currently far more Swiss consumers using sports streaming services. 12% of participants use at least one of the three main sports streaming services – compared to 7% a year ago.
A likely reason for the rising popularity of sports streaming services is that sports fans have been largely prohibited from attending live sporting events in stadiums, reckons telecom expert Ralf Beyeler.
Still, sports streaming services have not been adopted by the Swiss public on a broad scale. A relatively low 9% of survey participants use Swisscom’s sports streaming service, 6% use Sky Sports and 4% use DAZN. 3% of participants use two sports streaming services. Just 1% use all three of the major sports streaming services.
Battle between Netflix, Amazon and Disney+ carries on
If you only account for consumers who use at least one of the four major streaming services Netflix, Disney+, Amazon Prime Video and Sky Show, you get the following picture: 32% of participants only use one of the major video streaming services; 8% use two; 1.5% use three; and just 0.3% use all four of the major streaming services.
The number of consumers who are willing to pay for multiple streaming services remains low in 2021. Netflix continues to dominate the video streaming market, with four times as many users as Disney+, five times more users than Amazon Prime Video and twelve times as many users as Sky Show. For smaller streaming services, gaining a user base is extremely difficult.
The other major streaming services – namely Disney+ and Amazon Prime Video – are fighting hard to lure Netflix subscribers. All of the large streaming services do this by delivering as much exclusive content as possible and producing their own original films and shows.
Gold-digger vibe marks the streaming industry
“A goldrush vibe dominates the streaming industry,” according to Ralf Beyeler. Popular services like Netflix and Disney+ are already raising their prices. New service providers keep coming while others disappear. Quibi, a streaming service which delivered short-format shows for smartphone viewing, has already vanished from the Swiss marketplace.
Swiss video streaming service hit parade
The most popular video streaming services – including unpaid services – is YouTube from Google, which is used by 75% of residents. Netflix is next with 54%, followed by TikTok (13%), Disney+ (13%), Apple TV+ (12%), Amazon Prime Video (10%), Swisscom blue Max (9%), Swisscom blue Sport (9%), Google Play (6%), Sky Sports (6%), Sky Show (4%), DAZN (4%) and Netzkino (4%).
You can find an interactive graphic of Swiss video streaming survey results here.
Swiss audio streaming hit parade
YouTube is the most widely-used audio streaming service in Switzerland, with 62% of participants using YouTube to listen to music. Most consumers use YouTube’s free video streaming service rather than the paid YouTube Music service to stream audio.
YouTube is followed by Spotify (44%), Apple Music (16%), SoundCloud (11%), Google Play (10%), Amazon (7%), Deezer (6%), TIDAL (3%), and Napster (2%).
You can find an interactive graphic of Swiss audio streaming survey results here.
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