Free-to-air TV has the widest reach here
SINGAPORE — Free-to-air (FTA) television remains the most widely accessed medium, reaching more than eight in 10 of the adult population, based on the latest Nielsen Singapore Media Index which was released today (Nov 5).
Nielsen surveyed 4,683 people here aged 15 and above between July 2014 and June this year on their media consumption habits.
The results were weighted by age, sex and race to be representative of the Singapore population.
The report showed that 84.6 per cent of local viewers tuned in to FTA television channels weekly, while 65.5 per cent watched FTA TV daily.
The FTA channels are Channel NewsAsia, Channel 8, Channel 5, Channel U, Okto, Suria, and Vasantham. The Nielsen report showed that overall reach for FTA TV dipped marginally by 0.4 percentage points compared with the previous year.
However, figures tabulated separately by MediaCorp, which owns the FTA channels and this newspaper, showed that overall weekly TV viewership — referring to the actual number of viewers — grew 0.8 per cent. The Nielsen report showed that Channel 8 continues to be the most watched TV channel with a weekly reach of 57 per cent, followed by Channel 5 (45 per cent), Channel U (37.4 per cent) and Channel NewsAsia (31.2 per cent).
On a daily basis, four in 10 (41 per cent) adults in Singapore tuned in to Channel 8, followed by Channel 5 (19 per cent), Channel U (17.1 per cent) and Channel NewsAsia (14.5 per cent).
Among all the FTA channels, Channel 5 had the highest percentage of daily viewers aged 15 to 29 years old (23.5 per cent), while more than four in 10 (45.5 per cent) of Channel NewsAsia’s daily viewers were professionals, managers, executives and businessmen (PMEBs). After FTA TV, the Internet has the second highest reach at 79.2 per cent.
