FAST momentum continues with global channel count growing nearly 14% year-to-date

News and horror genres are biggest drivers of FAST expansion according to Gracenote Data Hub

NEW YORK, Aug. 27, 2025 /PRNewswire/ -- Gracenote, the content data business unit of Nielsen, has expanded its Data Hub resource to include insights on nearly 1,850 active FAST channels for a broad understanding of global streaming trends and the programs that keep audiences engaged. According to a new analysis of Gracenote's industry-leading global video dataset, the number of FAST channels grew nearly 14% from Q1 2025 and 76% since 2023. These insights and more are captured in the latest release of the Gracenote Data Hub covering Q3 2025 unveiled today.

The addition of FAST insights to the Gracenote Data Hub makes possible new comparisons with SVOD content and a holistic view of the global streaming landscape. First launched in November 2024, the resource was developed to provide insight into the catalogs of subscription video on demand (SVOD) leaders, Amazon Prime Video, Apple TV+, Disney+, Netflix and Paramount+. Now, the enhanced Data Hub enables visibility into more than 645K TV, movie and sports programs and episodes on SVOD platforms and more than 197K programs across global FAST channels.

Notably, FAST channels offer a greater percentage of more recent content than SVOD services. Nearly half of current FAST programming was produced in the last 5 years compared to nearly one third on premium SVOD. Focusing on content produced in the last 15 years, the numbers jump to nearly 80% for FAST and 68.5% for SVOD.

Given the linear, scheduled nature of FAST channels, the prevalence of TV programming is significant. In fact, nearly 93.1% of available content on FAST is TV programming (when individual episodes are counted). Comparatively, 88.8% of available content on top SVOD services is TV programming.

Sports accounted for the largest increase among all content types for SVOD in the last three months, a jump of 13.2%. By comparison, movie content on SVOD grew 10% while TV content increased 9.2%. Focusing on FAST, sports programming was down 3.7% over the same period but up 14% year-to-date.

Other findings in the new Data Hub update include the following:

• Focusing on FAST genre composition, documentary accounted for the largest concentration of programming at 16.1%
• Drama was the second most prevalent genre at 10.6% while news was third at 9.9%
• Looking at FAST genre growth, news led all categories with a 37% programming increase followed by horror with a 30% increase
• In terms of SVOD, major platforms grew their overall content offerings by 9.8% in the last three months
• Amazon added the most titles quarter-over-quarter (12.6%) followed by Paramount+ (6.4%)

Tapping industry-leading Gracenote Global Video Data covering content in more than 70 languages and more than 80 countries, the Data Hub helps video services, content owners and advertisers develop smart content distribution, licensing and media buying strategies. In addition, the resource provides trustworthy data to media and analysts seeking to understand the evolution of streaming.

About Gracenote
Gracenote is the content data business unit of Nielsen, providing entertainment metadata, content IDs and related offerings to the world's leading creators, distributors and platforms. Gracenote has aggregated, normalized and enriched core program metadata covering 40M+ titles in 260+ streaming catalogs in 70+ languages and 80+ countries. Gracenote technology enables advanced content navigation and discovery capabilities helping individuals to easily connect to the TV shows, movies, music and sports they love while delivering powerful content analytics making complex business decisions simpler. For more information, visit Gracenote.com.

SOURCE Gracenote