The percentage of non-white actors playing leading roles in the most-watched shows on television has fallen by 7% this year, according to an analysis by Samba TV.
Samba, a real-time insights and audience analytics firm, said this is bad news for TV networks and streaming services because the non-white population is growing and viewers are more likely to watch shows in which they are represented.
Similarly for advertisers, consumers are more likely to be engaged and persuaded by characters they identify with.
“Unfortunately, as the United States grows more and more diverse, TV has not followed suit,” Samba TV says in its State of Diversity on TV report.
“As we strive to create data at the heart of TV and power a better viewing experience for everyone, we hope that our new analysis will show what’s working and where our industry can do better, because everyone benefits from a viewing experience that is representative and empowering,” Samba said.
Within the top 50 TV shows, 39% of top-billed actors were Hispanic, Black, Asian, or another ethnicity such as mixed or Native, while 61% were white, up 5%, Samba TV found.
The proportion of Americans who identify as ethnicities other than white has already hit 41% and continues to increase, and before 2060 more than half of the country will be part of one of these minority groups, Samba TV said, pointing to Census data.
Hispanic actors were particularly underrepresented, with 40% fewer in top roles in the first half of 2024, compared to a year. Hispanic actors had just 6% of the most prominent parts, compared to Hispanic people being 19% of the U.S.
Black actors got 15% of top roles in the top shows, up 7% from a year ago. Asians got 7% of the top roles, unchanged.
In streaming shows, Black actors had 12% of the big roles, compared to 24% on shows on linear neworks.
Hispanic actors had 11% of lead roles on streaming, compared to 3% on linear shows.
Asian actors were cast in 13% of the top roles on cable and 7% of the leads on linear.
Across the streaming services and linear networks with top shows from 2024, Netflix and ABC were the only two where over half of leads within the top three shows were nonwhite.
Hulu, Max and Amazon Prime Video all tied for second place among the streamers, with slightly less than half of leads coming from diverse backgrounds, while Apple TV Plus and NBC each had just 22% levels of diversity.
Diverse shows tend to score with minority audiences.
Samba found a positive correlation of 39% among households with Black, Hispanic, Asian, mixed race, or another non-white ethnicity watching programs with higher percentages of non-white stars, indicating that cast diversity is a selling point among diverse households.
“With the streaming wars waging, content creators looking to boost viewership should increase cast diversity to gain attention from diverse populations,” the report said.
The strongest correlation was among Hispanic households with 50% of Hispanic households watching shows featuring a higher percentage of Hispanic leads.
Shows with a high percentage of Hispanic leads like Griselda dramatically over-indexing in viewership among Hispanic households.
While each of the top five advertisers served a disproportionate amount of ads to white households, other advertisers in different product categories are doing a good job at reaching different diverse groups.
Automotive advertisers like Acura, Kia and Volkswagen are serving more than 20% of their ads to Hispanic households.
TurboTax also distinguished itself by serving ads proportionately to Hispanic households at 19%.
At the same time, each of the top advertisers underserved Black and Asian households.
Representation drives engagement from diverse audiences. Hispanic, Black, and Asian households are all more likely to watch TV where they seem themselves represented, according to Samba TV.
“Advertisers looking to engage these audiences should work diversity into their creatives,” the report said. “To reach different ethnic groups, advertisers must look to advanced targeting tactics across CTV and digital that allow for precision.”
To reach Hispanic audiences in particular, advertisers should consider moving beyond putting ads on Spanish-language networks. “They should target viewers of top programs among Hispanic audiences, such as Griselda,” Samba TV said.
Diversity could also be a powerful weapon in the streaming wars. “With representation driving viewership, streaming platforms should focus on diversity as a differentiator,” the report said.
“As we strive to create data at the heart of TV and power a better viewing experience for everyone, we hope that our new analysis will show what’s working and where our industry can do better, because everyone benefits from a viewing experience that is representative and empowering,” the Samba TV report said.
Samba TV said its analysis is based on the top 25 highest-reaching direct-to-streaming and top 25 highest reaching linear-TV premiere episodes that were released between January 1, 2024 and May 1, 2024.
