Netflix always seems the dominant force in the streaming wars. The platform is the leader in global subscribers with over 300 million and constantly churning out high-rated movies and shows. And the new report from JustWatch reveals the platform holds the crown.
However, the data from JustWatch also reveals that the big red N has stiff competition from major streaming rival, Prime Video. Although Netflix won, it only holds a narrow lead of just 1% over Prime Video, with 26% and 25% market share respectively.
Based on data from 3.8 million monthly users across the UK, this report presents a detailed view of current consumer preferences and shifting platform performance. Netflix retained the top spot in the nationwide streaming market.
JustWatch is the world’s largest streaming guide with more than 60 million monthly users across 140 countries in one place movies, TV series, and sporting events from hundreds of streaming platforms worldwide including Amazon Prime Video, Netflix, Disney Plus, Apple TV+, ITVX, and many others, making it easy to find out where you can legally stream them.
JustWatch’s Market Shares are calculated based on user interest in our website, TV, and mobile apps. User interest in the United States is measured by adding movies or TV shows to their watchlist, clicking out to a streaming service, filtering multiple streaming services, and marking titles as “seen.”
Disney+ followed with a strong 20%, while Apple TV+ held 8%—roughly one-third of Netflix’s share. ITVX and NOW TV each secured a 6% share, with Channel 4+ representing a modest 2%, just a quarter of Apple TV+’s presence.
Despite this, Netflix remained the dominant network.
Why Netflix is so popular?
Netflix is essentially a storehouse of content, including movies, documentaries, and television series, both pre-existing and its own. Although not the first, Netflix is certainly the most innovative for pioneering the subscription-based streaming model, which became highly successful. They also innovated in user experience and personalized recommendations.
It was 2007 before internet speeds got fast enough, and personal computers got powerful enough, to allow streaming services to take off commercially. Netflix came out with a streaming service that year.
For the first time, customers could watch a TV show or movie on a computer, TV screen, tablet, phone, or gaming device. And consumers could watch what they wanted, when they wanted, and how they wanted it, without being limited to a schedule, interrupted by commercials, or even leaving home.
In 2013, Netflix began producing original content of its own, a risky and expensive proposition. At a time when the networks generally approved shows based on pilots that hit certain metrics, Netflix offered series producers and showrunners upfront contracts to create an entire season or two.
Best shows on Netflix currently showing
Netflix users continue to be treated to the best new releases, with this week beckoning in the end of one of its biggest hits, You.
Returning for its fifth and final season, the series goes back to its native New York where psychotic protagonist Joe Goldberg (Penn Badgley) has fame, fortune but still can’t quite shake the urge to kill. This final chapter is set to be one epic final outing for the series which initially premiered all the way back in 2018.
Another Netflix big-hitter that returned recently was Black Mirror for its seventh season, where the game-changing dystopian series brings back recent Emmy winner, Cristin Milioti. There is also the much-talked-about crime miniseries Adolescence. The show, starring and produced by Stephen Graham, has taken the nation by storm through its dark and visceral take on misogynistic-led murders.
Netflix has also added to its library with the latest cinema releases, including the latest Paddington film, Paddington in Peru.
Netflix has also been expanding its library with shows that originally aired on Sky and Paramount Plus, including Brassic and Gangs of London from the former, and Yellowstone and Halo from the latter.
