Executive Summary

Consumers in Canada will spend almost 10 hours daily with media in 2019. While that’s a roughly even split between digital and traditional media, digital has inched ahead this year. Mobile devices and a healthy appetite for digital video are driving digital’s ascent.

Has overall media time in Canada reached a saturation point?

It has. At almost 10 hours daily—or 41% of the hours in the day, to be precise—consumers’ media plates are full. This follows a decade when digital formats increased access to media and multitasking, driving total media time to new heights.

What format is driving the heaviest media usage?

Digital video is extremely popular in Canada, bolstered by heavy usage of YouTube and Netflix. In fact, digital video’s share of time spent in relation to TV is higher in Canada than in any other country in our global forecast.

How much media consumption is taking place on mobile devices?

Mobile now makes up almost a third of all media time—on par with TV. The heavy reliance on smartphones and tablets for breaking news and social networking has stolen time from desktop/laptops.

How much time are consumers spending with traditional media formats?

Time spent with traditional media formats like TV, radio and print is declining. But the reach of TV and radio keep them as a go-to source for specific use cases. For example, auto commutes maintain a committed audience to terrestrial radio.

WHAT’S IN THIS REPORT? This report covers our new forecast for consumer time spent with media in Canada, while comparing and contrasting media habits in Canada with other countries. We also look at social media time, which represents a significant component of consumers’ media lives.

KEY STAT: Digital now accounts for 50.1% of total media time spent in Canada, following a decade of increased media access made possible by digital devices and groundbreaking new services.

Behind the Numbers

eMarketer’s methodology for its Canada time spent with media forecast is based on an analysis of 599 metrics from 45 sources. This analysis involves the collection of third-party data—primarily survey data—from adult respondents, asking them about their media use habits. Data is also sourced from online and mobile activity tracking services, government data and interviews with industry experts.

Using a bottom-up analysis, we assess and analyze reported time spent with each device and media activity across various sources. And where definitions differ, the data is normalized and interpreted in terms of our definition (i.e., the Canada population ages 18 and older). The data is then aggregated with the time contributions from each device and media type to arrive at an estimate for average time spent with media per day.

In order to arrive at forecasts for growth rates by media and by device, this analysis is followed by extensive assessments of historical and expected future growth patterns with regard to device adoption, multiple and overlapping device usage, population and demographic factors and competitors to existing devices and activities.