How much bigger is ESPN than FS1? – March 2018 Cable Coverage Estimates

To answer the question in the headline, according to Nielsen, as of the March cable universe coverage estimates ESPN is in 3.02 million more homes in the USA than FS1.

**DO THESE NUMBERS INCLUDE STREAMING SERVICES LIKE SlingTV, Vue and DirecTV Now?**

In the past that was a simple question to answer. The answer was “no.” Some people didn’t like it but it was simple! December 2016 was the last month that was the case though.

Starting with the January 2017 estimates the answer changed to “Yes….kind of.” The sample of the streaming-only households seems very, very small (161 homes!) even relative to a TV panel that makes many people foolishly long for a census (Around 40,000 homes and 100,000 people). Nielsen currently projects there are currently 2.5 million streaming only homes added to the mix. The good news is that it’s counted. The bad news is those services aren’t growing enough to offset the overall pay TV losses.

From February to March of 2018 the streaming services again helped but couldn’t pick up all the slack. The traditional bundle lost on average 372,000 households from February to March estimates and the newfangled bundle only added 231,000 reducing overall pay TV losses to 141,000. That’s still a pace for net losses nearing two million households a year.

WHAT THE HELL HAPPENED AT XYZ NETWORK?

As ever it’s best to use these monthly estimates directionally over the long haul and not pay any/much attention to the goings on in any particular month. But the usual reasons for big monthly spikes are carriage squabbles or a change in tier (from less expensive to more expensive or vice versa).

Nielsen cable (includes satellite & telco services) coverage estimates for ALL nationally measured cable networks for March 2018:

Just one table for all the networks with changes versus the February estimates. Here are all the “How Much Bigger is ESPN?” posts I’ve done on this site over the past few years. If you’re more of the”wayback machine” sort, here’s July 2011).

If you’re on a mobile phone these tables should be much easier to read if you tilt your phone to landscape mode.

All data ©Nielsen (data provided by a variety of TV network sources and not directly from Nielsen)
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