Number of the Day
Daytime Is the New Prime Time, by the Numbers
Remote workers are watching more TV during working hours
26: That’s the increased number of minutes that professionals and managers working from home spent watching TV during work hours, as of October, according to Nielsen. A spike in daytime viewing (defined as 9 a.m. to 4 p.m.) was expected early in the pandemic era when offices closed abruptly and widespread lockdowns stranded a huge chunk of the workforce indoors. But this year-to-year comparison, which cuts across age segments, shows a 21% increase and suggests a more profound shift, Nielsen argues: “daytime has become a second primetime.”
The increased tube attention (which includes streaming video and DVR viewing) works out to roughly two hours and 10 minutes over the course of the workweek. As Bloomberg notes, this trend could end up having repercussions for advertising buys (and, one assumes, for productivity). So far, though, more TV viewing during the day has not had much impact on TV viewing at night. At least among professional types, Nielsen reports, “these same viewers increased their usage between 5 p.m. and 8 p.m. as well.”
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