The European Audiovisual Observatory (EAO) recently published “The Impact of Cinema Admissions on SVoD Usage”, a report that analyses media consumption patterns across Europe. The aim of the study is to understand the relationship between subscription video on demand (SVoD) consumption and cinema admissions by examining data from nine EU countries: Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Poland, Spain and Sweden.

The surveyed figures for SVoD span a timeframe from 1 September 2022-1 September 2023, while cinema admissions data are divided into two periods: Part 1 (a comparison between cinema admissions and SVoD consumption) covers 1 January 2022-31 December 2022, whereas Part 2 (the correlation between cinema admissions and SVoD consumption) spans from 1996-2023.

The main findings show that films produced in the EU garner a greater share of cinema admissions (28%) than their share of SVoD consumption (22%). There are significant variations between countries, with a large gap in France and Denmark and, to a lesser extent, in the Netherlands, Finland and Germany. Conversely, in Sweden, Poland and Spain, EU films have a similar share of cinema and SVoD viewing, whereas in Italy, EU films account for a higher share of SVoD viewing than cinema admissions.

Moreover, movies rely more on their national markets in cinemas (84% of admissions) than on SVoD (62% of viewing). Other reports from the EAO show that, on average, EU films are released in more countries on SVoD than in cinemas, leading to higher non-domestic viewership. Germany is an exception, as it is the only country where non-domestic cinema admissions and SVoD viewing are similar.

Furthermore, the EAO research indicates that strong cinema performance does not necessarily translate into strong SVoD results. Despite most of the top 100 films by cinema admissions since 1996 being available on SVoD, fewer than 20% of them rank among the top 100 most-viewed films on SVoD. EU blockbusters from 1996 onwards are even less likely to make it onto the list of most-viewed EU films on SVoD.

Across all sampled countries, theatrically released films make up 46% of the SVoD catalogue but account for 57% of total viewing time, with peaks in Sweden and Denmark. Additionally, films that were released in cinemas generally outperform non-theatrical releases.

Sixty percent of films show consistent performance across both cinemas and SVoD, meaning they either perform below the median in both or above the median in both. EU movies follow the same pattern, with 58% maintaining similar rankings.

On the other hand, only a small proportion of films perform significantly better on SVoD than in cinemas. Specifically, 20% of all films – and 21% of EU films – rank below the median in cinemas but above the median on SVoD. However, differences exist between various types of productions. Newer films, particularly those from the EU, are more likely to excel on SVoD, even if they underperformed in cinemas.

The full report can be accessed here.