Ofcom releases 1Q 2011 UK Digital Television Update

Ofcom consumer survey results for the first quarter of 2011 show that take-up of digital television in UK households stood at 93.1%, up by 1 percentage point year on year.

Consumers are continuing to convert additional sets in the home. 75.7% of all secondary TV sets had been converted to digital by the end of March 2011, up by 5.2 percentage points in a year.

Taking these figures together, 83.3% of all TV sets had converted to digital television by the end of Q1 2011.

Sales of DTT-enabled equipment reached 3.2 million units in Q1 2011, down by 6.3% in comparison to Q1 2010. Integrated digital television sets (IDTVs) accounted for over 81.3% of sales in the quarter (2.6 million units). Almost all TV sets sold (99.6%) included an integrated digital decoder. Freeview set-top boxes accounted for over 596,000 sales in the quarter, down by 30.3% on Q1 2010.

In the twelve months to the end of Q1 2011 12.6 million DTT units (IDTVs and set-top boxes) were sold, compared to 13.7 million in the previous year, a decrease of 7.8%.

Digital terrestrial television (DTT) equipment quarterly sales:

DTT quarterly sales (000's)              Q1 2010  Q2 2010  Q3 2010  Q4 2010  Q1 2011
                                         -------  -------  -------  -------  -------
Freeview set-top boxes                       855      724      603      756      596
Integrated Digital Televisions (IDTVs)     2,540    2,341    1,896    3,099    2,586
Total sales                                3,395    3,065    2,499    3,855    3,182
DTT DVR sales*                               207      153      146      290      201

Source: Sales figures from GfK, as adjusted by Freeview. The 5% upwards adjustment represents Freeview’s estimate of the number of DTT set-top boxes and IDTVs sold in Northern Ireland and offshore islands.
*DVR sales include devices that combine DVR and DVD recording functionality. DVR sales listed above are also included in the total sales.

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