Fox has now confirmed this year’s Super Bowl was the most live-streamed Super Bowl in history. As is the case with streaming in general, each year seems to result in more people turning to streaming to consume video and Super Bowl LIV was no different.
Super Bowl LIV took place on Sunday February 2, 2020 and saw the San Francisco 49ers take on the Kansas City Chiefs. In the end, it was the Chiefs who walked away victorious after beating the 49ers by 31–20. Now, it looks like more people tuned in via streaming to watch the Chiefs win than in any past Super Bowl year.
Drawing on data provided by Adobe Analytics, Fox says Super Bowl LIV ended up with an average minute digital audience of 3.4 million. When drawing comparisons, Fox says this is a significant increase compared to the 1.7 million noted for 2017 – the last time Fox streamed the event. This was also roughly a 30 percent increase over last year when the average digital audience was 2.6 million.
On the wider note, Fox confirmed that across all TV platforms, 148.5 million viewers watched all or part of Super Bowl LIV, with the average audience registering 102.1 million. All of which resulted in Super Bowl LIV becoming the 10th most-watched Super Bowl ever, and the fourth most-watched program in Fox history.
Super Bowl on Fox not without its issues
Although the Super Bowl proved to be a streaming success for Fox, the number of streamers was set to be significantly reduced prior to the start of the game.
In the days leading up to the big game, Roku began advising device owners that it was removing multiple standalone Fox channels from the Roku platform. This was due to the end of a licensing deal between Fox and Roku and was set to leave many Roku users with limited options to stream the game.
The following 24 hours proved to be extremely busy for Roku users with many taking to social media to vent their frustration at the dispute and the limited advance warning that had been provided to them. However, shortly before the deadline was due to take efffect, Fox and Roku confirmed a deal had been done to keep the standalone Fox channels on the Roku platform.
Source: Fox
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