Only 25% of main sets are analogue

Figures from Ofcom today show that the Freeview platform is still popular with 6,592 UK consumers joining every single day.

^{Brian Butterworth published on UK Free TV 21st December 2006 at 11:51}

Figures from Ofcom today show that the Freeview platform is still popular with 6592 UK consumers joining every single day between July and September this year. The number of people joining BSkyB's pay platform is just edging ahead of those opting to use the Freesat service. The majority of cable customers taking digital services still comprises of customers who are upgrading from analogue cable, giving a daily growth figure of only 244 customers.

25.3 million TV homes

This now means that just 25.2% of UK homes use analogue terrestrial TV for their main set (plus 1.6% using analogue cable), 27.7% with Freeview, 30.9% taking a BSkyB subscription service. Digital cable customers are 11.5%, with Freesat trailing on 3.0%.

60 million TV sets

However, the picture is very different when considering all TV sets, rather than just the main one. Freeview is used in many homes on second sets, this means that just over half 56.0% of all televisions are analogue (mainly terrestrial, but 0.7% digital cable).