Another win for Amazon Prime.
The company said on Jan. 2 that the second year of its deal to broadcast the National Football League's "Thursday Night Football" averaged 11.86 million viewers on Prime Video, up 24% versus its inaugural season in 2022.
Peak viewership across the 15 NFL games that Prime Video aired — which included the first-ever Black Friday game — was 13.93 million, up 23% versus last season.
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Marie Donoghue, Amazon's Vice President for Global Sports Video, posted about the company's success on LinkedIn.
"What a great way to end 2023 and start 2024. So proud of these results and all the folks who contributed. Thank you and congratulations to the entire Amazon team — your relentless focus on quality, delivery and innovation is unmatched. Thank you to the NFL for your unparalleled commitment to partnership. And thanks to all our customers — you are why we do what we do," Donoghue wrote.
While the viewership number from Prime Video is still several million lower than when aired on national television channels, the increase is a positive sign that viewers are beginning to flock to the platform despite it being behind a paywall.
Amazon also boasted that the median age of viewers of its games this year was 48.5 years old, nearly seven years younger than the average age of NFL on linear television and nearly 14 years younger than the average prime time television viewer during fall 2023.
That will likely be a major selling point for the company to advertisers looking to promote to younger audiences.
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But the question remains whether Amazon (AMZN) -) will have control over the NFL and sports streaming market or whether others can come in as well. NBC aired its first Peacock-exclusive game on Dec. 23 — a match-up between the Buffalo Bills and Justin Herbert-less Los Angeles Chargers — and it averaged 7.2 million viewers, lower than any Prime Video game over the last two years.
Amazon is expected to also make a push to be a part of the National Basketball Association's next media rights deal which would begin during the league's 2025-26 season.
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