Key Points:

• Sports fans are spending over $110 per month to watch live events on broadcast, cable and streaming TV.
• Most sports fans in America are using streaming platforms, either on their own or in combination with traditional TV, to watch live games.
• Broadcast and cable TV still account for the highest share of sports viewership, though streaming platforms are catching up as more rights move to those services.

Sports fans are among the highest spenders of premium television programming in the United States, and most of them are purchasing access to streaming apps in order to stay on top of their favorite teams and events, according to new research released by Parks Associates this week.

In a new white paper called “Streaming Live Sports: Where Opportunity Meets Complexity,” analysts with Parks Associates examined certain trends associated with the shift of live sports to streaming, with 70 percent of Americans paying for streaming services in order to watch live athletic events.

Among those who watch sports, 30 percent pay for a traditional form of premium television like cable, satellite or a streaming, cable-like service in addition to a pure streaming platform like Amazon’s Prime Video, Paramount Plus or Peacock, while 40 percent are watching live sports on streaming platforms alone, the research revealed.

Around one in five sports fans watch live events exclusively on broadcast, cable TV or satellite platforms — Parks considers them to be “sports traditionalists,” and the research firm says this group of sports fan is shrinking by the day.

Sports continues to be a powerful driver of viewership toward linear TV, and is one of the genres of content that keeps most Americans paying for some form of premium live TV — be it cable, satellite or a streaming cable alternative.

The average sports fanatic spends more than $110 each month just to stay on top of their favorite sports team or event, a price that takes into account cable or a premium cable-like service in addition to all the streaming platforms needed to stay on top of sports throughout the seasons, according to Parks.

For sports fans, the landscape is getting more fractured: Some of the most-watched sports in America, including baseball, basketball and hockey, are now split across regional sports networks available on cable and other pay TV platforms and streaming apps like Prime Video, ESPN Plus and Apple TV Plus, each with their own monthly or annual fee.

Some free, ad-supported streaming TV (FAST) platforms have grabbed live sports rights over the past few years, but those rights tend to be relatively few (as in the case of Roku’s pursuit of Sunday morning games from Major League Baseball) or based on sports with relatively niche interest (such as Fox-owned Tubi’s distribution of NBA G League games).

Even when a streaming service grabs most or all of the rights to a live sporting event, streaming isn’t pulling in the viewership found on broadcast and cable TV. During last year’s Summer Olympic Games, Comcast’s Peacock offered live streams of all competitions and multiview channels with aggregated coverage — and, yet, Nielsen data showed most sports fans watched coverage of the Olympic Games on NBC during prime-time hours, according to ratings data from Nielsen, Adobe Analytics and other sources evaluated by The Desk last year.

The Olympics were not an outlier: The same thing happened earlier this year when Fox aired Super Bowl LIX. For the first time, Tubi offered a live simulcast of the championship NFL game, and in ultra high-definition (UHD/4K), something no Fox-owned or affiliated TV station could offer. Still, nine out of 10 Super Bowl viewers watched coverage on their local Fox broadcast outlet, according to ratings data.

Still, streaming platforms open up opportunities for viewers, sports franchises and broadcasters that traditional TV cannot — at least not right now.

“Sports fans now have more ways than ever to engage with their favorite teams or sports. Many niche sports and out-of-market matches, previously unavailable, are now easily accessible, which can expand the sports audience, and providers have new opportunities to engage viewers in interactive activities, such as multicasts, live chats, and in-game betting, provided the experience is easy and seamless,” Michael Goodman, a senior analyst at Parks Associates, said in a statement.

Some of those features could make their way to broadcast and cable TV over time, especially if new technology like NextGen TV catches on.