Live sports viewing continues to be a major draw for the broadcast segment, shattering last month’s record and posting its best month since November 2024.
According to Nielsen’s monthly gauge report, which provides a snapshot of total TV and streaming consumption, the broadcast segment increased by +0.3% from October to 23.2%. These numbers put the broadcast segment’s latest performance slightly behind November 2024’s strong performance of 23.7%.
November appears to be the month of peak broadcast TV viewing, with Thanksgiving Day being the pinnacle. The day accounted for 103.4 billion minutes of TV consumption, driven by the NFL and the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade.
Football remained the driving force for the broadcast segment during the month, as action from the NFL and college football boosted ABC, CBS, FOX, and NBC. Along with football, the MLB World Series’ final games, which aired in early November on Fox, resulted in a +30% increase in sports viewing for the segment.
CBS Sports’ Thanksgiving Day matchup featuring the Kansas City Chiefs and the Dallas Cowboys had 11.7 billion viewing minutes, making it the top broadcast telecast of the month.
In November, the streaming segment also carried significant weight, benefiting from sports programming, with Peacock and Paramount+ getting big boosts.
Peacock posted the best monthly growth among streaming platforms in November, increasing by +22% on the strength of its NFL Sunday Night Football coverage and Thanksgiving Day programming. It featured simulcasts of NBC’s Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade and a primetime NFL game, with the platform averaging 2.4 million viewers across the day, trailing only YouTube and Netflix in individual-platform totals.
Meanwhile, Paramount+’s usage rose by 18.4% month over month, driven by NFL games alongside the return of its original series Landman.
According to Nielsen’s Media Distributor Gauge, streaming continued its dominant stay at the top as the preferred TV viewing format, accounting for 46.7% of usage in November, improving by +1% from its October showing.
Unfortunately, the combined linear segment of broadcast and cable had a showing of 43.7, falling by -1.4% when compared to the previous month. The blemish within this combined segment was attributable to cable, whose performance of 20.5% was down -1.7% from October. On the other hand, the broadcast share was 23.2% in November, up +0.3% from the previous month.
Meanwhile, the Other category rebounded from its October showing, growing by +0.5% to stand at 9.6% for the month.
A closer look at the streaming category for November reveals that YouTube remained in first place among streaming services, accounting for 12.9% of all viewing, staying in line with its performance from the previous month.
Netflix continues to hold firm in second place with 8.3% of all total streaming consumption. This represented a +0.3% increase over October, with growth largely attributable to the return of Stranger Things, which generated nearly 12 billion viewing minutes.
The Disney group of streaming channels, comprising Disney+, ESPN+, and Hulu SVOD, accounted for 4.7%, down -0.1% from October. It was followed by Amazon’s Prime Video, which remained at 3.8%.
The Roku Channel saw gains of +0.1% to finish November with 2.9%, followed by the consortium of Paramount+ and PlutoTV. Paramount Global’s streaming platforms posted a +0.2% gain to stand at 2.3% for November.
Next in line was Tubi, which slid by -0.1% to 2.1% of all streaming consumption. It was followed by NBCUniversal’s streaming service, Peacock, which grew by +0.3% to 1.9%.
Warner Bros. Discovery’s streaming services, comprising HBO Max and Discovery+, remained steady with a 1.3% share of streaming consumption for November.
Finally, the other streaming category also stood pat at 6.3% in the recorded month.
See the media distribution ranking below:
Nielsen’s November 2025 TV Gauge report.
The November 2025 interval spanned five weeks, from 10/27/2025 through 11/30/2025. Nielsen reporting follows the broadcast calendar, with weekly intervals beginning on Monday.