Nearly four in 10 American TV consumers watch television with no sound. That’s according to newly released data from the advertising-focused industry advocacy group that will soon see Brad Seitter succeed Steve Lanzano as its Chief Executive Officer.
The fresh insights come courtesy of TVB, the not-for-profit trade association representing America’s local broadcast television industry, and its “2025 Video Media Devices and Usage Study.”
More than 5,000 respondents participated in the study conducted by GfK/NIQ, which attempts to better understand media device usage as it relates to video content. The hope is that its findings will help inform and improve the measurement of TV audiences.
As the TVB discovered, a “complex, multi-device media landscape” exists where TV remains central as consumption mediums are rapidly diversifying. “The study underscores the need for measurement systems to evolve to accurately reflect modern viewing behaviors, particularly as more viewers engage with local broadcast TV content through streaming apps.”
One of the biggest takeaways from the TVB study is that there is significant viewing of television with the video on and the speaker off, with viewers either muting, using earphones, earbuds, hearing aids, or closed captioning.
In particular, some 38% of respondents were viewing one or more of those ways in the past two months. These viewers could be undercounted with measurement that relies on audio, TVB suggests.
Is there a particular demographic where this is more common? Yes. Hispanics, Blacks and Adults aged 18-34 overindexed against the total population for this viewing trait.
HOW AMERICAN HOUSEHOLDS GET PROGRAMMING
The TVB study also looked into how households get their programming. The answer? They obtain it in many different ways, with 77% of households having at least one TV with a linear connection, and 67% of households having at least one TV with a streaming connection to SVOD/AVOD programming.
“Though current big data measurement is more focused on wired cable and wired satellite viewers, those opting to stream linear programming through apps from cable and satellite companies now represent half of households that have at least one TV set connected to cable or satellite,” TVB notes.
This trend will continue: some 54% of those that have a wired cable connection and 71% of those that have a hardwired satellite connection said they are likely to switch to an app that does not require a cable/box or pendant in the next six months.
Meanwhile, some 22% of households connect to programming with only a BBO streaming connection — meaning they use a streaming device like Roku or smart TV and do not use wired or unwired cable/satellite, over-the-air or vMVPD services.
Additionally, more than half of households with an OTA set or a vMVPD set have other linear TV connections; focusing on OTA or vMVPD only households (which exclude households with other connections) can undercount OTA or vMVPD viewing.
Among the other findings from TVB:
- The average number of TV sets per household is 2.8; about half of households have 3 or more sets, 24% have 4+ sets.
- Some of the segments that pose challenges to measure, also have above average number of TV sets (young adults, parents, Hispanics, and Black/African Americans).
- As the number of sets in households increase, the reliance on a single type of connection (e.g., only OTA, vMVPD, wired cable) decreases.
- Some 76% of households are able to stream linear TV programs and events through a mobile device or PC
- Some 79% of those that view live TV programming through a provider on a mobile device do so at least once a week, with nearly 70% doing so at least several times per week.
- Hispanic & Black/African Americans capability to stream linear TV programs and events through a mobile device is higher than average (84% for Hispanics and 85% for Black/African Americans compared to 76% for adults 18+).
- Half of households can access a local broadcast TV news app either on their TV or mobile device.
