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Comcast Lost 2 Million Pay-TV Subscribers in 2022, Broadband Sub Growth Cools
January 26, 2023
Comcast’s legacy cable pay-TV business continued an industrywide trend, losing 2 million subscribers in 2022, up from a loss of 1.66 million subs in 2021. The company ended last year with 16.1 million pay-TV subs, which was down about 11% from 18.2 million subs at the end of 2021.
The pay-TV subscriber losses underscore consumers’ ongoing migration from linear TV to alternative video distribution such as Netflix, Disney+, Prime Video, HBO Max, Hulu and Peacock, among others, and free ad-supported streaming television (FAST) platforms.
To help deliver streaming video to consumer households requires high-speed internet service, or broadband. Comcast remains the nation’s largest internet service provider, ending 2022 with more than 32.1 million broadband subscribers.
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At same time, that tally underscored a cooling off of broadband sub growth. The company actually lost 26,000 high-speed internet subs in the fourth quarter (ended Dec. 31, 2022). That compared with a gain of 212,000 broadband subs in the previous-year period. Comcast attributed the sub losses to the impact of Hurricane Ian in Florida last September.
For the fiscal year, Comcast added 250,000 broadband subs, down 81% from a gain of 1.33 million subs in 2021.
The decline in video subscribers helped lower Q4 programming expenses almost 6% in the quarter, partially offset by contractual rate increases. Programming expenses dipped 2.8% for the fiscal year.