It goes without saying these days that anything that can be done indoors is being done more. Indoors. Because coronavirus. And of course that means folks are watching more television.
HBO today shared some broad strokes of what it's seeing, including more people watching more shows across the entirety of the WarnerMedia empire, as well as on HBO proper.
Here's what it's seeing :
- "Across the portfolio" — as in on traditional devices like cable as well as smart TV and mobile devices — viewing of WarnerMedia properties like HBO, TNT, TBS and TruTV has increased 20 percent.
- Since Saturday, March 14, HBO has seen its highest usage since summer 2019, with "time spent with the platform" up 40 percent from its four-week average.
- The final season of Westworld is driving things. But the excellent Euphoria has doubled its 4-week average, and Big Little Lies , Chernobyl , Game of Thrones , and His Dark Materials are all up more than 50 precent, too.
- Ebola: The Doctor's Story is up "more than 7 times greater than recent weeks."
- The Wire — considered by many to be the best series ever — tripled its most recent audience. And HBO staples Sex and the City and The Sopranos nearly doubled.
- Movies are doing well, too, HBO says, including the uppers Armageddon , Black Swan and Apocalypse Now .
Suffice to say that trend should continue for everyone — particulary the streaming services. Netflix, YouTube and others already have proactively lowered streaming quality a bit to lessen the toll on networks all over the world.
The real question is how long the worldwide shutdown will last — and at what point will it affect future lineups as production schedules are knocked out of whack.
More: What's new on HBO in March 2020
Also: What's new on HBO in April 2020
