This year, for the first time, we see a decline in access to SVOD in Belgium. Having peaked at 53% in 2021 and remained constant in 2022, access to SVOD is down to 47% in 2023, with Netflix showing the biggest drop from 46% to 38%.

Last year was the first year where we did not see a drastic increase in SVOD subscriptions in Belgium with price rises and the end of COVID likely to blame. This year, the price rises and the increased cost of living are clearly the driving factors behind the drop in SVOD access.

11% of respondents said that they had cancelled a service over the past year, about half plan to resume the service later. What may be a concern for SVOD providers is that the incidence of churn has risen year on year (7% in 2021 vs 11% this year in Belgium), for both temporary and permanent cancellations.

Indeed, the rising cost of living appears to be a major driver of cancellations. Of the top three reasons for cancelling over the previous year, two were definitely cost-related. ‘Subscription was too expensive’ was cited by 25% of respondents, up from 23% in 2022, and ‘rising costs in other areas’ was mentioned by 24%, up from 15%.

The third factor, ‘didn’t use it enough’ may well be a proxy for value for money, equivalent to a cancellation on the basis that a service was no longer essential and so could be discarded.

With increasing living costs come reduced spending on entertainment and leisure. However, Belgians are trying to find new ways to still have access to streaming content while paying less. And this is even more true for the youngsters.

As a consequence, not every legitimate user is the bill payer, and not every user may be legitimate. 19%of respondents share their subscription bill cost with someone else and 16% have access to a service they do not even pay toward.

The incidence of sharing is most widespread among the youngest age groups. Among 16-24 year-old users, 59% are using a Netflix subscription that is shared among two or more households. Among 25-34 year-old users, the proportion is lower, but still over 54% and drops to 30% for the 35-44 age group.

While the majority of adults (59%) do not share their access to video subscriptions outside their household, 39% share accounts between two or more households.

With the market reaching saturation, streaming platforms need to find new ways to make money. Netflix, for example, has put a lot of effort into curbing password sharing, and has also launched a new pricing plan that includes a subscription with ads.

When asked what they would do if video streaming platforms were to ban sharing of video subscriptions with people outside the household, only 17% would consider taking out a second account at full price. 31% would consider paying extra, less than the full price of a second account, to keep sharing a video subscription account.