Paramount Exhibits Largest Monthly Increase in April’s Media Distributor Gauge, Driven by CBS
Disney and NBCUniversal Also Gain Share
NEW YORK – May 27, 2025 – YouTube maintained its lead among media companies in Nielsen’s April 2025 Media Distributor Gauge report, representing 12.4% of audiences’ time spent watching television. This marks YouTube’s third consecutive month atop the Media Distributor Gauge, as well as its largest share of TV to date.
April 2025 is the first time that company rankings in the Media Distributor Gauge have stayed exactly the same month over month since Nielsen began tracking this data in November 2023. Disney held the second largest share of TV in both April and March, and this month represented 10.7% of total television. Disney’s 0.2 point gain over March was partly driven by cross-network coverage of the NFL Draft, the NCAA Women’s Basketball Championship and the first round of the NBA Playoffs. Disney also owned April’s top streaming title, Grey’s Anatomy, which notched 3.9 billion viewing minutes and benefited from its multichannel and multiplatform availability.
Paramount comprised 8.9% of total TV watch-time in April and exhibited the largest monthly share increase among media companies (+0.4 points, which, based on unrounded figures, was slightly larger than YouTube’s increase). Viewership gains to its CBS broadcast affiliates drove more than half of Paramount’s monthly growth. NBCUniversal rounded out the top four media distributors in April with an 8.2% share of TV, up from 8.0% in March.
Warner Bros. Discovery maintained 6.7% of TV usage this month, boosted by a 58% lift in viewership to TNT, which televised 18 first round games of the NBA Playoffs (through April 27). WBD was also buoyed by its HBO series The White Lotus, which was the second most watched streaming title in April with 3.7 billion viewing minutes on Max. The White Lotus was also No. 1 in Nielsen’s Streaming Top 10 during the weeks of 03/31/25 – 04/06/25 and 04/07/25 – 04/13/25, totaling 1.31 billion minutes and 1.25 billion minutes, respectively.
The April 2025 interval included dates 03/31/2025 through 04/28/2025. Nielsen reporting follows the broadcast calendar with measurement weeks that run Monday through Sunday.
About The Gauge™
The Gauge™ is Nielsen’s monthly snapshot of total broadcast, cable and streaming consumption that occurs through a television screen, providing the industry with a holistic look at what audiences are watching. The Gauge was expanded in April 2024 to include The Media Distributor Gauge, which reflects total viewing by media distributor across these categories. Read more about The Gauge methodology and FAQs.
About Nielsen
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