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Streaming Video Quality Way Up But Not for Ads, Says Conviva

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Good news for viewers: streaming video quality is improving. Conviva has released its Q3 2019 State of Streaming report, and the latest findings show improvements in video quality. Year-over-year, video start failures are down 10%, video start times are 6% faster, buffering is down by a big 33%, and picture quality is 3% better.

News 2"As streaming providers compete against the seamless delivery of linear television, viewer expectations demand linear quality from their streams without failures, delays, buffering, or poor picture quality," the report says. "Streaming providers, along with many industry stakeholders, have continued to invest in technology, redundancies, and oversight to make this a reality. In Q3 they delivered large improvements to that end."

But these improvements only apply to content videos. For video ads, quality is poor. In Q3 2019, 39.6% of all video ad plays failed, while long start times were common. These problems are costing publishers views, as 9 to 20% of all viewers quit watching every time an ad comes up.

The report also looks at TV streaming device use and finds Roku still the major player. Roku owns 44% of market share and saw a 73% increase in viewing time. Amazon Fire TV is next with 20% market share, although its viewing time increased faster—by 78%. Apple TV follows with 9% market share.

Conviva's data comes from a proprietary sensor embedded in 3 billion video apps, which measure over 100 billion global streams per year. Ad data comes from an analysis of almost 10 billion ad attempts in Q3.

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