Disney, Warner Bros. Discovery, Hallmark, Netflix and Amazon saw major gains in TV viewership during December, with their shares being boosted by holiday movies and football.
Per Nielsen’s latest media distributor gauge, Disney saw a 4% increase in overall viewing for a share of 10.7%, the highest increase for a multi-platform distributor for the month. The company maintained its second-place ranking behind YouTube, which ended the month with a share of 12.7%.
Disney’s growth was fueled by a 30% viewership increase for ESPN, driven by Monday Night Football, the expanded College Football Playoffs schedule, and College Gameday. Freeform also doubled its November viewing, driven by holiday films such as “Rudolph The Red-Nosed Reindeer” and “Frosty The Snowman.”
Netflix was propelled into the third place spot, driven by its NFL Christmas Day doubleheader, coupled with the success from the most-streamed original series ever – “Stranger Things” – resulting in a 10% monthly viewing increase and a total share of 9%.
Rounding out the top five was Paramount with an 8.6% share of TV viewership and NBCUniversal with an 8.2% share, while Fox finished in sixth place with a 7% share.
Warner Bros. Discovery ranked in seventh with a 5% share, but saw a 23% increase at TBS and a 24% increase at TNT, driven by coverage of the College Football playoff and holiday movie viewership, with “A Christmas Story” leading the way for TBS. Additionally, HBO Max also saw a 10% viewing increase, primarily driven by original series “It: Welcome To Derry,” alongside the continued popularity of “The Big Bang Theory” and “Friends.”
Amazon finished in eighth, notching a 12% viewing increase driven by Thursday Night Football, a Christmas Day NFL game and “Fallout” Season 2 to 4.3%, a platform-best. Meanwhile, The Roku Channel saw a 45% year-over-year increase and 190% increase since December 2023, finishing with a record 3% share.
The remainder of the list included Scripps with a 1.7% share, Weigel broadcasting with a 1.3% share, Hallmark with a 1.2% share, A+E Networks with a 0.9% share and AMC Networks with a 0.7% share. Hallmark was the leader in the holiday movie genre, securing the top 5 movie telecasts across cable distributors with “She’s Making A List,” “Single On The 25th,” “A Suite Holiday Romance,” “A Make Or Break Holiday” and “Oy To The World.”
Overall, the streaming category made up 47.5% of TV viewership in December, while broadcast made up 21.4% and cable made up 20.2%.
Broadcast network affiliate contributions declined this month compared to November, with all major networks down due to less high-profile sports coverage, including the absence of Thanksgiving NFL games, a reduced college football schedule on broadcast, and no World Series games. Cable news networks were also down for the month.
In addition to the individual platform gains, Christmas Day 2025 smash the record for most-streamed day ever with 55.1 billion viewing minutes, driven by Netflix and Prime Video’s NFL coverage.
