An early commitment of streaming platforms is that users will be able to watch series and movies without programming ads breaking on broadcast or wired networks. That's not the case: Almost every major streamer has an ad-supported layer, and new data from Nelson suggests that many viewers are using them.

Rating providers released their first ad support scale, indicating that nearly three-quarters of TV usage (72.4%) in the first quarter came from ad-supported platforms, whether traditional networks and wired outlets or streaming through ads. In the United States, only 27.6% of views are free.

The release of ad-supported data was weeks ahead of expectations from major media companies to advertisers. These companies are selling major growth narratives of advertising revenue on their platforms.

Disney+ advertising revenue is expected to exceed $17 million in the first quarter of 2025, 98% from the same period last year, while Netflix is ​​likely to receive $502 million in advertising revenue in the same framework (which will increase 88%), while Amazon Prime Video may receive $476 million (82% increase) from research firms on April 21 (82% increase).

"As we enter the upfront, this ad supports our industry-defined gauges report provides a deeper analysis to help guide advertising strategies," Nielsen CEO Karthik Rao said in a statement.

Streaming commands have the largest share of TV viewing in the United States, and are also the largest segment of advertising-supported viewing – although overall use of broadcast and cable sockets exceeds that of advertising-supported areas. This only makes sense, as the vast majority of network and wired programming (except PBSs and premium sockets like HBO, Showtime, and Starz) come with ads, while streaming platforms offer the option to watch ads for free.

In the first quarter of 2025, streaming accounted for 42.4% of all ad-supported TVs. Multiply by 72.4% of viewing on the AD support platform, which is equivalent to 30.7% of all TV usage via ad-supported streaming. The entire streaming used an average of 43.3% of TV usage this quarter, meaning that most streaming viewing (about 70%) had ads.

Cable accounts for 28.9% of advertising-supported viewing from January to March, with a range of 28.7%. In Nielsen's regular specifications, 23.9% of all TV usage and broadcasts for cable TV is 21.4%. (The "Other" category in the monthly meter, including physical media playback and gaming, belongs to the ad-free bucket here.)

Nielsen will release the ad-supported gauges report quarterly, with the next month going one month and changing before the 2025-26 TV season begins.