Research suggests Australians cancelled 1.3 million streaming accounts in the three months to last December. 

Data from research company Kantar’s Entertainment on Demand survey shows that about 6.11 million Australian households held a subscription to at least one streaming service -  a fall of 38,000 during the December quarter, in addition to the 180,000 drop in the September quarter.

The proportion of Australian households subscribed to Netflix fell for a fourth consecutive term to 76.8 per cent, but it remains the dominant platform by far, followed by Amazon Prime Video (33.4 per cent) and Disney+ (31.2 per cent).

Apple TV+ led the cancellations with a 22 per cent churn rate, followed by Optus Sport with 20 per cent, and YouTube Premium with 18 per cent. 

Netflix had a 3 per cent cancellation rate, with 16 per cent of its new subscriptions being for its cheaper, $6.99-a-month advertising-supported tier that launched in November.

Offsetting the cancellation spree, about 490,000 new streaming services were bought by Australian homes in the three-month period. Australians now have an average of 3.4 streaming accounts, down from 3.5 last quarter.

“The decline has slowed this quarter, but if you think about the average household having 3.5 services, there are definitely people thinking about how they can cut back a little bit,” Kantar’s Tamsin Timpson has told reporters.

“It’s declined by 0.1 quarter-on-quarter – but across households, that’s quite a big number. People are being a bit more discerning about what they spend their money on. Streaming platforms used to cost $6 or $7 a month, but they’re more expensive now.”

One in four streaming households said they planned to cancel a service in the next three months.

“A far higher than average proportion of those who have cancelled their Netflix service in the fourth quarter of 2022 cited the need to save money as their primary reason,” Kantar noted in its survey results.