The early pandemic period in 2020 led many Americans, while stuck inside for months, to get rid of traditional cable TV in favor of streaming options. And that trend continued in a big way in 2021, according to a report released Tuesday. 

According to Leichtman Research Group, Inc., the major pay-TV providers in the United States lost another 4.7 million paying subscribers in 2021, after they lost a collective 4.8 million in 2020. Those companies, the same firm said earlier this week, added just under 3 million broadband subscribers last year. 

That left the companies with a total of around 76.1 million subscribers at the end of 2021, of which 41.3 million are to cable companies, 26.8 million to satellite, telco, and “other” services, and 7.9 million to vMVPDs. 

The cable sector actually lost more subscribers in 2021—nearly 2.7 million—than they did in the quarantine year of 2020 when they lost about 1.9 million, Leichtman said. Every major cable company lost subs in 2021, led by Comcast with a loss of 1.6 million, Charter with a drop of 367,000, and Cox with a loss of 260,000. 

The company that lost the most subs last year was DirecTV, which lost 1.9 million, in the year that it was spun off from AT&T into an independent company. Dish Network also lost 595,000 subscribers, while Verizon Fios lost 283,000 customers last year from its pay-TV business. 

The news was more positive for the vMVPD sector, with all three listed adding subscribers last year. Hulu + Live TV gained 300,000 subscribers, FuboTV added 581,927, and Sling TV added 12,000. YouTube TV was not included in the Leichtman survey but is believed to have gained subscribers last year. Sling TV, while positive for the year, dropped over 200,000 subscribers in the fourth quarter, Dish said in its most recent earnings report. 

An Omdia report last week found that the vMVPD sector reached 13.6 million subscribers in the U.S. last year, with YouTube TV pulling in 39 percent of the subscribers. 

Leichtman’s survey is assembled mostly from public earnings reports, although in some cases, such as post-AT&T DirecTV, the numbers come from estimates. “While the pay-TV industry continued to lose subscribers, net losses in 2021 were fairly similar to those in recent years,” Bruce Leichtman, president and principal analyst for Leichtman Research Group, Inc., said in the release. “In 2021, the top pay-TV providers had a net loss of about 4.7 million subscribers, compared to a pro forma loss of about 4.9 million subscribers in 2020, and a loss of 4.1 million in 2019.”

Stephen Silver, a technology writer for The National Interest, is a journalist, essayist and film critic, who is also a contributor to The Philadelphia Inquirer, Philly Voice, Philadelphia Weekly, the Jewish Telegraphic Agency, Living Life Fearless, Backstage magazine, Broad Street Review and Splice Today. The co-founder of the Philadelphia Film Critics Circle, Stephen lives in suburban Philadelphia with his wife and two sons. Follow him on Twitter at @StephenSilver.

Image: Reuters.