Video streaming services more popular than TV among youth

Agrima Jain

Jalandhar, June 16

In today’s era, video streaming services have taken over television, especially among the youth.

Most young professionals, school and colleges students and hostellers, who have limited access to TV, prefer following applications including Hotstar, Netflix, Amazon Prime and Voot and have got used to this entertainment medium now. These are online services through which customers can watch a wide variety of TV shows, movies, documentaries and much more on internet-connected devices.

Over the past five years, a technological revolution has set pace and more and more people are watching their favourite films and television shows over the internet. There are reportedly 75 million users of Hotstar in India.

Rishika, a frequent App user, says, “Hotstar airs amazing shows like Game of Thrones, Koffee with Karan. It also streams live cricket matches and give full coverage of the IPL. So, I can watch it anywhere and anytime.”

Similarly Netflix, which was launched in India just two years ago, already has 5 million subscribers in India. Netflix is producing hits like ‘Stranger Things’, ‘House of Cards’, ‘Orange is the new black’ which are loved by the audience today.

Diksha Bhutani , a Netflix subscriber, said,” Through Netflix, I can watch my favourite show anytime during the day as opposed to television that follows a fixed schedule. Also, I can pause my show in the middle if I have some work and resume it later, which is not possible while watching TV. Netflix is also advertisement-free. So the annoying hassle of advertisements is also not a problem.”

Stand up comedy groups like AIB appeal to young college students today. The past five years saw the rising trend of web series in India. Web series like ‘The Pitchers’, ‘Permanent roommates’, ‘Band Baja Baraat’ attracted the attention of the young audience.