Netflix Users Reclaim 140 Hours Others Spend Watching TV Ads

Discussions of cord-cutting usually touch on the financial and less-limited aspects of eschewing traditional television. The latter of those two talking points are less relevant today as networks embrace on-demand and live streaming, but there's another aspect of ditching cable that, well, cable can't compete with: the lack of advertisements. Some video streaming services like Hulu still have commercials, but others like Netflix don't, and those who use Netflix are regaining a significant number of hours otherwise spent watching TV commercials.

The information is based on data from a TDG study, which reveals Netflix users average an hour and a half of Netflix watching every day. In addition, Nielsen says that an hour of traditional TV has about 15.5 minutes of commercials. Exstreamist used that data to figure out about how much time Netflix users are spending not watching commercials.

Exstreamist found that users save about 130 hours a year when they watch the content on Netflix, as that 130 hours would otherwise be spent simply watching commercials (crunching the numbers, as Mary Sue points out, is actually closer to 140). The numbers, when laid out that way, are fairly startling — every year you spend nearly a full week just watching advertisements, assuming you watch an average of 1.5hrs of TV per day.

Whether Netflix users make up that time by watching more Netflix shows is unclear, but if you do, the video streaming service is hoping you'll fill in those time slots with some of its original programming. Starting in October, the company will be releasing the first among its original full-length movies.

SOURCE: The Mary Sue