Moves in recent months have shown multiple streaming services are working to incorporate short-form and creator content into strategies and new survey data from Hub Entertainment Research sheds some light on continued consumer appetite for social video – including on the TV screen.
But while some findings from Hub’s latest “Video Redefined” survey, fielded in December 2025, suggest increased competition from social video apps and support the notion that streamers need to expand their own offerings to include creators and different content types or formats so they can better tap into that consumer affinity and consumption behavior, others indicate there’s also opportunity for longer-form content.
Because although social video platforms like TikTok and Instagram keep capturing time and attention among younger viewers (and related ad dollars), survey responses show they’re also discovery vehicles. And aside from launching their own short-form or creator content efforts, Hub suggests that streaming service marketers can capitalize on the consumer guilt byproduct and related perceived “vice” of endless social video scrolling and position TV and movies as a “better” way to spend time watching.
A top-line finding from Hub’s survey is that since 2022 average hours spent weekly watching TV and movies (among weekly social/creator video content viewers) declined by about two hours to 19, while weekly time spent viewing creator or social video held steady around 11 hours.
Interestingly, in that period Hub found weekly social video viewing among younger viewers (age 13-24) actually declined by an hour to about 12 but ticked up by roughly an hour for those age 35 years and older to 9.8 hours. Time spent weekly watching social video among 25-34-year-olds held steady from 2022-2025 at just under 13 hours.
Younger viewers enjoy short-form on the TV screen
There remains industry debate around whether YouTube is “TV,” but the video platform’s pole position on CTV (as evidenced in part by its repeated dominance in Nielsen’s The Guage monthly U.S. TV time share tracker) is less of a question.
Regardless of how industry players aim to categorize YouTube, Hub’s latest survey gives credence to the idea that consumers’ definition of “watching TV” has expanded – and streamers may do well to follow suit.
Per Hub, well over half of Gen Z viewers age 13-34 agreed that watching short YouTube video clips on the big TV screen is just as fun as watching longer TV shows and movies. The sentiment is more split among viewers age 35 years and older, with about 39% agreeing and 33% disagreeing.
And with YouTube’s expansions into more traditional and long-form programming (such as the recent deal for exclusive global rights to the Oscars starting in 2029) and Meta recently starting to test Instagram Reels on CTV, competition with social video-first platforms could further intensify on the living room’s largest screen.
That said, younger generations’ consumption of short-form and social video and love for creators certainly doesn’t appear lost on media companies and streaming services, many of which have announced or started testing out ways to capitalize on the seemingly unabating trend.
We’ve written before about how multiple free ad-supported streaming TV services like Fox’s Tubi, Samsung TV Plus and others are taking various approaches to bringing creators into their content lineups – from YouTube videos repurposed for CTV and dedicated creator-focused FAST channels to original content deals with popular social video creators.
Hub’s survey shows appeal among younger cohorts for social and short-form content on the TV screen, but some streamers are first starting out with mobile efforts and vertical video feeds to cater to multi-screen behaviors and enhance and complement their long-form offerings.
By way of some examples, Disney at the start of the year disclosed plans to introduce a personalized vertical video feed on the Disney+ mobile app in the U.S. – specifically designed to up engagement and encourage daily usage of the app by showcasing short-form Disney content. That follows success of a similar feature called “Verts” that was first tested on Disney’s flagship direct-to-consumer ESPN mobile app last fall.
The Fox One streamer also launched last year offering a personalized vertical video feed on mobile dubbed Shorts that features sports highlights, clips and commentary.
Inspiration for the feature came in part from the fact that younger generations aren’t necessarily watching full live sports games and get a lot of sports content from social, according to Fox One SVP of Product Amit Dudakia.
“If we know we’re going after an audience of cord cutters and cord nevers who are, generally speaking, getting their live event coverage in different forms through social, how do we replicate that in some way and make it even better,” Dudakia described in an interview with StreamTV Insider about building the Fox One UX.
Netflix, which already expanded to start streaming video podcasts in January, disclosed during earnings earlier this month that it has been testing short-form vertical video features on its mobile app for the past several months.
According to Netflix co-CEO Greg Peters, so far feeds have featured clips of Netflix shows and movies but will likely soon start to include additional new content types, including video podcasts, as it rolls out more broadly in 2026.
“You can imagine us bringing more clips based on new content types, like video podcasts, which Ted [Sarandos] mentioned that we’re adding to the general service. We’ll bring the sort of appropriate components of that into that vertical video feed,” Peters said.
Consumers like ease of microcontent
Another trend Hub’s survey zeroed in on is the rise of serialized short-form vertical video shows, also known as microdramas or microcontent. In current iterations this format is usually heavy on drama and tells a scripted story over a series of micro episodes (usually 1-3 minutes in length).
According to the survey, 22% of viewers say they’ve watched microdramas. Top reasons for watching microdramas include that they’re quick and easy to watch (47%), consumers are curious about them (41%), stories are dramatic and suspenseful (37%) and they can watch them anywhere (37%).
Some of the early and most popular apps have come from China-based companies, but U.S. streamers are also looking to get in on the microdrama trend.
TelevisaUnivision is among early movers, testing out microdramas since last summer for its Spanish-language SVOD ViX (for more on that foray read here). So is Spanish-language AVOD player Canela Media, which plans to expand microcontent efforts dubbed Canelitas this year. Others are also entering the space, like the Llyod Braun and Cineverse-backed joint venture MicroCo.
One of the most recent examples came this week from Fox Entertainment, which aims to lean into both microseries and creators. Fox Entertainment announced a multi-year deal with the digital studio from popular creator Dhar Mann (who also has an original content deal with Samsung TV Plus) to create and produce a slate of 40 original scripted “narrative-driven” vertical video titles.
The first shows are expected to roll out this spring and initially be available exclusively on microdrama video platform Holywater.
Capitalizing on social video as a “vice” and promotional vehicle
Although Hub’s survey shows consumers continue to spend time with and enjoy social/creator and short-form videos, it doesn’t spell all gloom for streamers or longer-form content.
Because younger generations might spend a lot of time scrolling social video, but it doesn’t always leave them feeling warm and fuzzy.
Hub found that guilt is often a by-product of social video viewing, with more than half of those age 13-34 agreeing they often feel like their watching too much on platforms like TikTok and Instagram – and should be watching TV shows and movies instead.
Hub’s suggestion is that marketers lean into that perceived “vice” or “not good for me” vibe consumers can get from time spent viewing social video and leverage it as a chance to pitch or remind them about the “redeeming qualities” that longer-form content can arguably provide.
But as streaming services potentially extol the benefits of their content versus social video and compete against social video giants, those same platforms can also act as a place to market their longer-form and tentpole programming to younger viewers.
It reasons that streaming services likely want users watching and engaged on their respective platforms as often and as long as possible, but Hub survey data shows social video apps like TikTok are a key destination for younger people to first find out about TV shows and movies, serving as content discovery and promotional vehicles for streamers’ catalogs.
Per Hub, 59% of viewers 13-24 said they often discover new TV show and movies by watching clips on apps like TikTok and Instagram. That rises to 65% among those age 25-34 and dips to about one-third among those 35 and up.
“Viewers embrace how easy and fun it is to watch social and creator videos at YouTube, TikTok and Instagram," said Jason Platt Zolov, study author and Senior Consultant at Hub, in a statement. "As this content continues to migrate from mobile phones to living room TV sets, there's great opportunity to develop even more compelling creator programming - as well as unique ways to promote traditional TV and movies via those social platforms.”
TikTok itself wants to monetize its utility as a content discovery tool for traditional TV and film. Just last week during the Sundance Film Festival the social video giant announced two new ad options designed for entertainment providers and streaming services to promote their content titles and drive subscription signups and ticket sales.
The ad options on TikTok target high-intent users that have shown interest in entertainment and then shows them relevant titles from a streaming service advertiser’s library or tentpole events like sports and film releases.
Per TikTok, 4 in 5 of its users say the platform “inspires their streaming choices and encourages them to explore more content.” And in 2025 alone, TikTok saw an average of 6.5 million posts about film and TV shared every day on the platform.
So while streaming services may continue to compete against social video for viewer time and attention, as well as related ad dollars, Hub’s latest data and continued moves by the industry suggest a further melding of entertainment formats and what viewers consider “TV” is afoot - and where streamers' relationships with platforms like TikTok, Instagram and YouTube may continue to evolve in the frenemy variety.