comScore Releases December 2011 U.S. Online Video Rankings

Average Viewer Watched 3 Hours of Video Content on Hulu in December

RESTON, VA – comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR), a leader in measuring the digital world, today released data from the comScore Video Metrix service showing that 182 million U.S. Internet users watched online video content in December for an average of 23.2 hours per viewer. The total U.S. Internet audience viewed 43.5 billion videos.

Top 10 Video Content Properties by Unique Viewers

Google Sites, driven primarily by video viewing at YouTube.com, ranked as the top online video content property in December with 157.2 million unique viewers, while VEVO ranked second with 53.7 million. Yahoo! Sites ranked third with 53.3 million viewers, followed by Viacom Digital with 45.8 million and Facebook.com with 42 million. More than 43 billion videos views occurred during the month, with Google Sites generating the highest number at 21.9 billion. The average viewer watched 23.2 hours of online video content, with Google Sites (7.9 hours) and Hulu (3 hours) demonstrating the highest average engagement among the top ten properties.

Top U.S. Online Video Content Properties Ranked by Unique Video Viewers
December 2011
Total U.S. – Home and Work Locations
Content Videos Only (Ad Videos Not Included)
Source: comScore Video Metrix
Property Total Unique Viewers (000) Videos (000)* Minutes per Viewer
Total Internet : Total Audience 181,669 43,472,412 1,389.8
Google Sites 157,188 21,897,734 471.9
VEVO 53,674 801,334 68.0
Yahoo! Sites 53,328 630,605 61.0
Viacom Digital 45,764 506,140 57.5
Facebook.com 42,024 238,671 23.9
Microsoft Sites 41,133 587,842 44.8
AOL, Inc. 40,375 451,496 55.1
Hulu 31,242 776,999 181.2
Amazon Sites 27,818 95,444 17.4
Turner Digital 26,692 211,662 27.3

*A video is defined as any streamed segment of audiovisual content, including both progressive downloads and live streams. For long-form, segmented content, (e.g. television episodes with ad pods in the middle) each segment of the content is counted as a distinct video stream.

Top 10 Video Ad Properties by Video Ads Viewed

Americans viewed 7.1 billion video ads in December, with Hulu generating the highest number of video ad impressions at nearly 1.5 billion, followed by Adap.tv in second with 1.1 billion. Tremor Video ranked third with 942 million, followed by BrightRoll Video Network with 872 million and Specific Media with 496 million. Time spent watching video ads totaled more than 3 billion minutes during the month, with Adap.tv delivering the highest duration of video ads at 636 million minutes. Video ads reached 51 percent of the total U.S. population an average of 46 times during the month. Hulu delivered the highest frequency of video ads to its viewers with an average of 46.

Top U.S. Online Video Ad Properties Ranked by Video Ads* Viewed
December 2011
Total U.S. – Home and Work Locations
Ad Videos Only (Content Videos Not Included)
Source: comScore Video Metrix
Property Video Ads (000) Total Ad Minutes (MM) Frequency (Ads per Viewer) % Reach Total U.S. Population
Total Internet : Total Audience 7,115,272 3,009 45.6 51.4
Hulu 1,493,649 621 46.1 10.7
Adapt.tv 1,116,051 636 13.8 26.7
Tremor Video** 941,875 525 16.8 18.5
BrightRoll Video Network** 872,188 536 7.9 36.4
Specific Media** 495,869 235 6.1 27.0
Videology** 455,733 256 8.1 18.6
AOL, Inc. 330,446 212 7.6 14.3
Undertone** 311,226 150 10.3 9.9
Auditude, Inc.** 309,981 136 8.7 11.7
Microsoft Sites 297,531 119 10.4 9.4

*Video ads include streaming-video advertising only and do not include other types of video monetization, such as overlays, branded players, matching banner ads, homepage ads, etc.
**Indicates video ad network
†Indicates video ad exchange

Top 10 YouTube Partner Channels by Unique Viewers

The December 2011 YouTube partner data revealed that video music channels VEVO (53.5 million viewers) and Warner Music (31.7 million viewers) maintained the top two positions. Gaming channel Machinima ranked third with 22.7 million viewers, followed by Maker Studios with 10.4 million, FullScreen with 9.7 million and Big Frame with 8.3 million. Among the top 10 YouTube partners, VEVO demonstrated the highest engagement (67 minutes per viewer) and highest number of videos viewed (782 million), while Machinima exhibited the second highest engagement (64 minutes per viewer) and number of videos viewed (340 million).

Top YouTube Partner Channels* Ranked by Unique Video Viewers
December 2011
Total U.S. – Home and Work Locations
Content Videos Only (Ad Videos Not Included)
Source: comScore Video Metrix
Property Total Unique Viewers (000) Videos (000) Minutes per Viewer
VEVO @ YouTube 53,464 782,292 66.9
Warner Music @ Youtube 31,665 206,538 29.2
Machinima @ YouTube 22,737 340,057 63.9
Maker Studios @ YouTube 10,404 81,115 29.7
FullScreen @ YouTube 9,698 41,523 18.1
Big Frame @ YouTube 8,336 43,418 19.3
Collective @ YouTube 7,328 59,485 24.6
Demand Media @ YouTube 7,299 19,646 9.3
IGN @ YouTube 6,967 28,035 17.5
Bigpoint @ YouTube 5,772 29,015 19.8

*YouTube Partner Reporting based on online video content viewing and does not include claimed user-generated content

Other notable findings from December 2011 include:

– 85.3 percent of the U.S. Internet audience viewed online video.
– The duration of the average online content video was 5.8 minutes, while the average online video ad was 0.4 minutes.
– Video ads accounted for 14.1 percent of all videos viewed and 1.2 percent of all minutes spent viewing video online.

About comScore
comScore, Inc. (NASDAQ: SCOR) is a global leader in measuring the digital world and preferred source of digital business analytics. For more information, please visit www.comscore.com/companyinfo.