The FIFA World Cup set new live-streaming records for South African-based streaming service Showmax Pro.
Football fans across Africa glued to their devices as they streamed the highly anticipated quarterfinals, semi-finals and finals of the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022, courtesy of SuperSport and streamed in HD and 4K.
In the initial stages of the event, subscribers were more likely to stream the match highlights that were available on demand, but as the tournament neared its conclusion, streaming live increased.
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The nail-biting final between Argentina and France saw the highest number of concurrent streams of a live event in Showmax Pro’s history, a more than 20% increase in viewership. The number of new subscribers to Showmax Pro increased steadily across the month of December peaking on 18 December 2022, the day of the final.
“We’re incredibly proud that Showmax successfully streamed the entire World Cup without a hitch and delivered 4K to our subscribers for the first time across the continent. We look forward to bringing even more of the world’s best sport to our customers in 2023, starting with the Premier League, Serie A and LaLiga, and the DStv Premiership,” says Barry Dubovsky, COO for Connected Video at MultiChoice.
Most-streamed matches of the World Cup
Based on the total number of users, these were the most-streamed matches of the tournament.
1. Argentina vs France
2. France vs Morocco
3. Croatia vs Brazil
African streamers’ top 10 favourite teams
Based on the total number of match views during the group phase across all Showmax Pro markets in sub-Saharan Africa, these were the most popular teams:
- France
- Morocco
- Argentina
- Brazil
- Portugal
- Netherlands
- England
- United States
- Ecuador
- Ghana
Penalties drove subscriber and viewership spikes
An interesting trend was seeing the impact of penalties on the number of new subscribers signing up for Showmax Pro, as well as on viewership. In every match that went to penalties, there were significant spikes as fans signed up and started live streaming.
Now that the tournament has ended, 2023 brings a wealth of international football to watch, including the Premier League action this weekend – on Saturday, Man U takes on Man City in the Manchester derby.
On Sunday, Tottenham faces Arsenal in the North London derby. All Serie A and La Liga games are also currently streaming live on Showmax Pro, as well as the DStv Premiership matches, and the TotalEnergies African Nations Championship kicks off on 13 January.
Take advantage of Showmax Pro’s currently reduced prices, available for R299 p/m and R199 p/m for mobile in South Africa. Enjoy streaming on your smart TV, AndroidTV, tvOS, Streama, Explora Ultra, or any other 4K playback device with instant action on the go. Go to showmax.com to sign up.
