NMHH: streaming services are more popular in households with children

The authority’s communications directorate wrote in a statement sent to MTI on Tuesday that the primary reason for the additional costs is that those raising children typically use more of these services – for example, only 18 percent of households without children use streaming, while this rate is already 69 percent among households with two or more children.

According to the statement, a Hungarian household spends approximately 24,000 forints per month on communications services, but according to NMHH data, these expenses of families may increase by approximately 3,400 forints per month per child. The reason for the higher spending is that households with children typically subscribe to more communication services than others – for example, they are more likely to order TV and streaming services – they added.

The NMHH pointed out that traditional television service is already very widespread in our country, with ninety percent of households subscribing, but for those with children this rate reaches almost 100 percent. The effect is much more striking for streaming: only 18 percent of households without children watch movies at home in this way, while for those with one child the rate is 39 percent, and for those with two or more children it is already 69 percent, they drew attention, noting that Netflix is also the most popular streaming service among families with children, but the viewership of Disney+ – which offers content not only for minors – is also exceptionally high.

The authority also reported that the age of the children is also an important factor in a household’s communications expenditure: mobile phone use is not typical among young people before the age of 6, but becomes almost universal by the age of 12. The youngest mobile users usually use prepaid cards for related services, as these are more financially controllable than monthly subscriptions, they wrote.

They also announced that according to the study, a prepaid mobile subscription used by a child means an average of 4,300 forints extra expenditure for households per month, while a monthly subscription for the general population costs an average of 6,400 forints per month. It is worth noting that this is still more favorable than the average monthly mobile subscription of 8,200 forints typical for the adult population, they drew attention to it, adding: the phenomenon is that eight out of ten of 9-11 year olds already use some kind of mobile subscription, but only four out of ten use mobile internet. According to the survey, young people only start making phone calls and using mobile internet at a rate similar to adults when they are 12-17 years old, they announced.

According to the NMHH, the research also shows that families with children can save significant amounts of money with family packages. With these plans, families can reduce their monthly communication service fees by an average of HUF 1,600 compared to other subscriptions – although the big trump card of family packages, the possibility of free conversations between family members, has now been somewhat diminished by the unlimited domestic calling option that is increasingly common in mobile tariffs, they explained.