Many more people are jumping from one streaming subscription to another, a behavior that could have big implications for the entertainment industry.

Americans are getting increasingly impulsive about hitting the cancellation button on their streaming services. More than 29 million — about a quarter of domestic paying streaming subscribers — have canceled three or more services over the last two years, according to Antenna, a subscription research firm. And the numbers are rising fast.

The data suggests a sharp shift in consumer behavior — far from the cable era, when viewers largely stuck with a single provider, as well as the early days of the so-called streaming wars, when people kept adding services without culling or jumping around.

Among these nomadic subscribers, some are taking advantage of how easy it is, with a monthly contract and simple click of a button, to hopscotch from one service to the next. Indeed, these users can be fickle — a third of them resubscribe to the canceled service within six months, according to Antenna’s research.

“In three years, this went from a very niche behavior to an absolute mainstream part of the market,” said Jonathan Carson, the chief executive of Antenna.

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    • otp@sh.itjust.works
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      7 months ago

      It could fit.

      Each subscription is carefully planned based on what shows the family wants to watch.

      Each cancellation is on a whim. “Hey, the monthly bills are too high. Are we done with [service]?”

      • Aceticon@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        It doesn’t make any sense for somebody that “carefully plans” their subscription to be surprised by the monthly bills and “on a whim” cancel.

        Impulse buyers are the ones that get surprises at the end of the month.

        Judging by comments here, plenty of people carefully plan subscribing for one month only: so they subscribe and immediate cancel, all planned, and then have a month to see the bunch of series and movies exclusive to that provider that they planned to see.