The other day, Netflix did something that many thought they never would: share transparent data about its viewership. It released a thorough report (which you can download here) telling us what people watched from January to June of this year, cataloging every show that got at least 50,000 hours of viewing time. That’s thousands of shows, both made in house by Netflix and licensed.
For every show, Netflix shared how many hours it was viewed in that six-month period. It plans to do this twice a year going forward, which is a big change for a company that once jealously guarded its analytics. The choice to reveal more data, said Netflix co-CEO Ted Sarandos, is “on the continuum of transparency as streaming becomes more and more mainstream. It’s more on par with other parts of media that have quite accessible information about how things are performing.”
So what kind of information is in here? First up, let’s look at the top 10 most viewed shows on Netflix from January to June of 2023:
- The Night Agent season 1: 812,100,000 hours viewed
- Ginny & Georgia season 2: 665,100,000 hours
- The Glory season 1: 622,800,000 hours
- Wednesday season 1: 507,700,000
- Queen Charlotte: A Bridgerton Story: 503,000,000 hours
- You season 4: 440,600,000 hours
- La Reina del Sur season 3: 429,600,000 hours
- Outer Banks season 3: 402,500,000 hours
- Ginny & Georgia season 1: 302,100,000 hours
- FUBAR season 1: 266,200,000 hours
The Night Agent is a spy thriller that premiered in March. I remember hearing about Wednesday non-stop when it premiered on Netflix in late 2022, so I’m not surprised to see it in the top 10, but I don’t feel like I heard much about The Night Agent. But perception is not reality and the data proves it.
Netflix will be more transparent about its viewership data going forward
Speaking of shows that came out in March of 2023; that was also when Netflix released the second season of Shadow and Bone, based on the fantasy books by Leigh Bardugo. Later in the year, we learned that Netflix had canceled Shadow and Bone, along with a proposed spinoff based on Bardugo’s Six of Crows books.
Shadow and Bone was one of five shows Netflix canceled in November, along with the live-action drama Glamorous and the adult animated comedies Agent Elvis, Captain Fall, and Farzar. Of those, Shadow and Bone was the most successful; season 2 was the 26th most viewed show of the reporting period, having been watched for 192 million hours. Shadow and Bone season 1 was watched for an additional 100 million hours. That’s way more than something like Glamorous, which was viewed for 36 million hours.
Of course, Shadow and Bone also cost a lot more to make than any of those shows; it’s a high fantasy series set in a fantastical world where people can use magic. In the end, Netflix must have decided that the returns weren’t great enough to justify the cost.
There are other interesting notes to take from the report. Licensed content did very well, making up 45% of viewership; shows like Breaking Bad, The Walking Dead, Grey’s Anatomy and Suits were each watched for over 500 million hours. Netflix originals were still watched more than licensed shows and movies, but only just. There are also a lot of Korean-language shows on the list, proving that Squid Game wasn’t a fluke. We’ll keep digging.
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h/t Deadline