Recognizing 2024’s top Audience Rated TV Entertainment of the Year
For nearly 20 years, streaming has transformed the media landscape and revolutionized the way audiences watch television. With more streaming content available to be consumed on more apps and services than ever before, audiences are shifting more of their total TV time to streaming. Consider this: In May 2021, streaming accounted for about 26% of Americans’ total time spent watching TV, and that number has grown to over 43% as of December 2024. During that time, total TV usage has remained relatively steady; meanwhile streaming usage has skyrocketed.
Audiences spent over 12 trillion minutes streaming in 2024, which equates to about 8.4 billion days, or 23 million years’ worth. This is a 10% increase over 2023, which tallied 21 million years of streaming.
To help the media industry better understand the key trends driving streaming’s growth, Nielsen has released our annual “Streaming Unwrapped” report sharing yearly streaming viewership since 2020. This year, we’re expanding the report to include additional viewing categories, and renaming it the ARTEY Awards. Named for Nielsen’s founder, Arthur C. Nielsen, and an acronym for “Audience Rated Television Entertainment of the Year,” we’re recognizing the year’s most-watched TV shows and movies.
For the 2024 ARTEYS, we focused solely on streaming programs, which are measured and ranked based on total viewing minutes. Within streaming, there are many different content types. We recognized the following:
–Top New Streaming Original Series
–Top Overall Streaming Programs
Top New Streaming Original Series of 2024
At the beginning of 2024, the entertainment industry was still dealing with the effects of the Hollywood writer and actor strikes, which impacted the flow of new TV content for much of last year. The result was a slew of new original series that debuted across streaming platforms, in addition to seasonal premieres from established favorites. The ARTEY Awards for Top New Streaming Original Series recognize streaming titles in drama, comedy and unscripted genres that were introduced in 2024 and received the most viewing.
Top New Original Drama Series

ARTEY WINNER: Fallout, Prime Video, 11.95 billion minutes
Prime Video’s sci-fi-action-drama Fallout debuted on the platform in April and racked up 2.9 billion viewing minutes in its first few days of release. It accumulated nearly 12 billion total viewing minutes throughout the rest of the year, ultimately placing fifth among all streaming originals in 2024. Fallout, which only has eight episodes in its first season, was also the fifth most-watched streaming original among adults 18-34.
RUNNER-UP: Fool Me Once, Netflix, 10.89 billion minutes
Netflix’s British import Fool Me Once was second among new drama series with 10.9 billion viewing minutes in 2024. Compared to Fallout on Prime Video, Fool Me Once drew a bit of an older audience, getting 57% of its minutes from adults 50+.
Top New Original Comedy Series
ARTEY WINNER: Nobody Wants This, Netflix, 4.90 billion minutes
Netflix rom-com Nobody Wants This enjoyed three weeks atop Nielsen’s streaming charts following its release in late September, and went on to accumulate nearly 5 billion minutes through the end of year. While the show’s audience skewed toward women (69%), it was fairly balanced from an age perspective, coming in at 51% adults 18-49 and 43% adults 50+.
RUNNER UP: A Man on the Inside, Netflix, 2.94 billion minutes
Netflix’s new comedy series A Man On The Inside was released in late November and managed to accumulate nearly 3 billion viewing minutes in just a few weeks. Starring Ted Danson as a retired professor turned private investigator, A Man On The Inside appealed to an older audience with 62% of viewers aged 50+.
Top New Original Unscripted / Documentary Series
ARTEY WINNER: American Nightmare, Netflix, 3.57 billion minutes
This Netflix true-crime docuseries premiered on the platform with three episodes in January 2024. American Nightmare drove more than 1 billion viewing minutes in its opening week, and its viewing total reached over 3.5 billion throughout the year. The docuseries resonated most with women who made up 62% of the audience, as well as younger adult viewers, as 56% of the audience fell into the 18-49 age range.
RUNNER UP: Unlocked: A Jail Experiment, Netflix, 2.50 billion minutes
Unlocked: A Jail Experiment premiered on Netflix in April and finished the year with 2.5 billion viewing minutes across eight episodes from a fairly diverse audience, with Black viewers accounting for 23% of the viewing total and Hispanic viewers making up 18%. The series also ranked fifth among all unscripted originals in 2024.
While not in the top two for this category, we’re extending an honorable mention for new original unscripted series to a couple of additional titles:
- Hulu’s Secret Lives of Mormon Wives notched 2.14 billion viewing minutes over the last four months of the year after debuting its first eight episodes on the platform in September. The reality series has been renewed for a second season, which is set to be released on the platform this spring, and ABC announced it would begin airing the first season of the show on its linear network in January 2025.
- Beast Games premiered on Prime Video towards the end of December, and despite only three episodes available in the last days of the year, the competition-reality series still managed nearly 700 million minutes of viewing.
2024 Top Overall Streaming Programs
These ARTEY Awards recognize the most-watched streaming titles of the year across original series, acquired series, movies and overall.
Top Overall Streaming Title & Top Acquired Series

ARTEY WINNER: Bluey, 55.62 billion viewing minutes on Disney+
The ARTEY for Top Overall Streaming Title of 2024 goes to the Australian animated series Bluey, which put up over 55.6 billion minutes of watch time on Disney+, with 43% of its massive viewing total attributable to kids 2-11.
RUNNER UP: Grey’s Anatomy, 47.85 billion viewing minutes on Hulu and Netflix
With nearly 48 billion viewing minutes on both Hulu and Netflix in 2024, Grey’s Anatomy and its deep library of over 400 episodes continues to be a crowd favorite in both the streaming and linear TV spaces. Now in its 21st season on ABC, the medical drama created by Shonda Rhimes has been one of the top six most-watched streaming titles in each of the last five years (2020-2024), with over 185 billion minutes viewed in that time.
Top Streaming Original Series

ARTEY WINNER: Bridgerton, Netflix, 21.42 billion viewing minutes
The ARTEY for Top Streaming Original Series in 2024 goes to Netflix’s Bridgerton, which posted over 21 billion viewing minutes in 2024. Netflix released eight new episodes between May and June, which accounted for 56% of Bridgerton’s viewing total. In terms of its performance in Nielsen’s Streaming Top 10, Bridgerton has 11 appearances at No. 1 overall, tying fellow Netflix original series Ozark for the most first place weeks for any streaming original.
RUNNER UP: Love Is Blind, Netflix, 16.45 billion viewing minutes
Love Is Blind benefited from the releases of both its sixth and seventh seasons in 2024, and the two combined accounted for 82% of its 16.5 billion minute total. The show has a balanced audience that closely follows the makeup of the overall TV viewing population at 17% Hispanic, 5% Asian, 16% Black and 61% White, indicating broad appeal.
We’re also extending an honorable mention in this category to Prime Video’s The Boys, which had a stellar year and placed third among originals with 13.6 billion minutes viewed. It was also the top streaming original series among men 18-34 by a significant margin. Additionally, The Boys now holds the distinction of having placed in the overall Streaming Top 10 list more than any other Prime Video title (16 weeks).
Top Streaming Movie
ARTEY WINNER: Moana, 13.03 billion minutes viewed on Disney+
With over 13 billion viewing minutes accumulated on Disney+ in 2024, Moana finished as the most-watched streaming movie for a second consecutive year. The Disney favorite exhibited a bump in viewership towards the end of the year that coincided with the theatrical release of its sequel, Moana 2. This marks Moana’s most-streamed year ever and solidifies it as the most-streamed movie since 2020.
RUNNER UP: The Super Mario Bros. Movie, 11.72 billion minutes viewed on Netflix
The Super Mario Bros. Movie notched 11.7 billion minutes viewed on Netflix in 2024, with kids 2-11 accounting for 5.7 billion minutes of its total.
Both Moana and Super Mario Bros. drew strong Hispanic audiences as well, with 25% and 29.6% of viewing, respectively, attributable to Hispanic viewers.
Most-Binged Title
For this category, we examined streaming titles with extensive libraries (50+ episodes) and limited the calculations to viewers who had spent at least one episode’s worth of time with the show (20 min. or longer). While half-hour programs tend to be more binge-able, the level of dedication from audiences in viewing to programs across the board was astonishing.

ARTEY WINNER: The Big Bang Theory, 265.5 episodes per viewer on Max
The Big Bang Theory has a total of 281 episodes available on Max, and dedicated viewers averaged just over 265 episodes each over the course of the year! (Note, this does not mean they watched 265 unique episodes, just that they spent the equivalent of 265 episodes worth of time). This put the show head and shoulders above the competition for the bingeing crown. Coming in at No. 7 overall among this year’s top streaming titles, Big Bang tallied 29.1 billion minutes in 2024, 58% of which were driven by adults 18-49.
RUNNER UP: American Dad!, 175.3 episodes per viewer on Hulu
Adult animation series are extremely popular in the streaming-scape, with Family Guy, Bob’s Burgers, The Simpsons and South Park all finishing in the top 30 for total minutes in 2024. Also among them was Binge Category runner-up American Dad!, which averaged 175 episodes per viewer throughout the year on Hulu.
Legacy Award
The ARTEY Legacy Award recognizes enduring, timeless programs that continue to entertain and captivate audiences today.

ARTEY WINNER: Little House on the Prairie, 13.25 billion minutes on Peacock
Little House on the Prairie celebrated its 50th anniversary in 2024, having aired on NBC from 1974 to 1983. Whether it was nostalgia surrounding the anniversary milestone or the appeal of westerns among TV viewers, the show earned 13.3 billion minutes of viewing time on Peacock across the year. Adults 35-64 accounted for 63% of Little House’s overall viewing total, and it over-indexed among Black viewers, which comprised over 17% of its total viewership.
ARTEY WINNER: Gunsmoke, 10.23 billion minutes on Peacock / Paramount+
Gunsmoke was adapted for television in 1955 and ran for 20 seasons on CBS where it ranked as a top Nielsen-rated show for several years. Now close to 70 years since its debut, Gunsmoke is still delighting audiences across both scheduled (linear) TV and streaming platforms. The classic western series earned over 10 billion minutes of watch time in 2024 across Peacock and Paramount+. Its audience consistently skews toward the 50 and over crowd, and its viewership is strong among Black viewers who made up 36% of watch time in 2024.
2024 Top 10 Streaming Programs and Movies




Source: Nielsen Streaming Content Ratings based on the Nielsen U.S. National Television panel. Total viewing minutes based on Persons 2+. Streaming platforms: Amazon Prime Video, AppleTV+, Disney+, Hulu, Max, Netflix, Paramount+ and Peacock.
Interval: 01/01/2024-12/29/2024.
Want more insights into the time viewers spend watching streaming video content? Check out Nielsen’s Streaming Content Ratings.