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THE PLACE OF THE TV IN THE APARTMENT

7 minute read | January 2014

The most popular place for a TV is the bedroom: 71% of people living in a television household have a TV in that room. According to Nielsen Audience Survey data for October 2013, we spend most of our time watching TV in the bedroom, with 52% of the daily amount spent watching in the bedroom.

Budapest, January 6, 2014 – In October 2013, half of the households in Hungary had several televisions. The Nielsen Audience Survey used a special database of TVs to examine the placement of the TV in the apartment and the viewer behavior in different rooms of the apartment.

Distribution of daily TV viewing by room

The entire population spent more than half of their time watching TV in the bedroom, spending 145 minutes in October 2013 out of an average of 277 minutes of TV viewing per day. The TVs in the living room received an average of 108 minutes a day, the TV in the children’s room 12, the device in the kitchen 9, and the TVs in other rooms of the apartment only 3 minutes.
4-17 year olds spent a quarter of their 191 minutes a day watching TV in front of the nursery TV, with more time to watch TVs in both the living room and bedroom.

The distribution of nearly 4 hours of television viewing time per day by the commercially prominent 18-49 age group by room is similar to that of the total population: 52% of their TV time was spent in front of the device in the bedroom, 41% in the living room and 4% in the children’s room.
People over the age of 50 spent 6 hours a day watching TV in October, of which more time than average was spent in the bedroom and kitchen, and a relatively smaller amount in the living room.

Location of televisions in the apartment

Among the total population, the most popular place for a TV is the bedroom: at the end of October 2013, 71% of the television household had TV in the bedroom, 54% in the living room, 17% in the children’s room and 9% in the kitchen.
Half of those living in single-TV households had a single TV in the living room and 48% in the bedroom. In the vast majority of those living in a multi-TV household, 86% had one TV in the bedroom. 56% had TV in the living room, 27% in the children’s room, 15% in the kitchen and 5% in other rooms.


Those over the age of 50 have a higher proportion of TVs in the bedroom and a smaller proportion in the living room than the younger generations. For understandable reasons, the prevalence of TVs in children’s rooms shows the biggest difference by age: while 41% of 4-17 year olds live in a household with
TV in the nursery, the proportion is much lower for the other two age groups: 20% of 18-49 year olds and only 4% of those over 50 live in an apartment with a nursery and TV. The kitchen is dominated by people over the age of 50, but TVs do not increase the list of kitchen equipment to a significant extent, only 11%.

Daily access per room

More than 60% of those with TVs in the bedroom turned on the device for at least 1 minute a day, and daily access to TVs in the living room was similar. 29% of those with a TV in the children’s room used the TV here on a daily basis, compared to 44% with a kitchen appliance.
83% of those living in a TV household turned on the TV for at least a minute of an average day if it was in the bedroom and 76% if it was in the living room. 53% of those living in multi-TV households used their TV in the bedroom, 55% used the TV in the living room, 28% used TV in the nursery and 42% used TV in the kitchen. (Percentages are always for those who have TV in their room.)

Half of 4-17 year olds with TV in the nursery watched the TV here for at least a minute on an average day. The proportion of children who used the TV in the living room on an average day is slightly higher at 54%.
57-57% of 18-49 year olds watched TV in the bedroom or living room, provided they had a TV in that room. 20% of children in the nursery switched on the TV and 29% in the kitchen for at least a minute.


More than 70% of those over the age of 50 watched TV in the bedroom and living room daily. Most of those who kept TV in the kitchen, 63%, also used the device daily. However, the older room was not intensively watched by members of the older age group who had the opportunity to do so: only 10% of them watched the program running in the children’s room for at least a minute.

Daily watched time by room

The total population spent 204 minutes in the bedroom on an average day and almost the same amount, 202 minutes in front of the TV in the living room. Those who had a TV in the room spent 68 minutes watching TV in the nursery and 93 minutes watching TV in the kitchen.
Those living in a TV household watched TV for a longer period of time, 327 minutes, when it was in the bedroom than those who placed the unit in the living room. In the latter case, the daily average was 279 minutes.


Those living in multi-TV households watched an average of 159 minutes a day in the bedroom, 163 minutes in the living room, 62 minutes in the children’s room, and 85 minutes in the kitchen, provided there was TV in each room.
Looking at the daily viewing time in the different rooms of the apartment by age group, it can be seen that 4-17 year olds spend the most time watching TV in the living room, averaging 135 minutes per day; nearly 20 minutes more than the TV in the nursery. Young people who otherwise have a kitchen TV did not watch TV in the kitchen for half an hour.

People aged 18-49 watched 172 minutes a day in the bedroom and nearly the same amount of 170 minutes in the living room. Members of the age group who had a TV in the nursery used it for an average of three-quarters of an hour and watched the device in the kitchen for 52 minutes a day.
People over the age of 50 have spent more than 4 and a half hours in front of the device in the bedroom and the same can be said about watching TV in the living room. People over the age of 50 also watched TV in the kitchen for 145 minutes a day, but only had 18 minutes a day to watch the device in the nursery.

Audience Proportion of Channel Groups

In October 2013, national commercial taxes accounted for 30% of the total population’s time spent watching television. The general audience channels accounted for a total of 17%, public service broadcasters for 14%, movie channels for 9% and children’s channels for 5%, with the rest of the thematic channels sharing the rest of their TV viewing time. Time spent on DVDs, videos, or video games accounted for 3% of total TV viewing time and other TV usage for 7%.
Examining the channel references by room, it can be stated that the use of TV in the children’s room differs the most from the average: in the period under review, the program of children’s channels accounted for a large quarter of the TV consumption in the children’s room. Consumption of national commercial channels and the proportion of DVD, video and video games in children’s room television are still slightly higher than average. Film and public service channels, on the other hand, account for an average share of in-room TV use.
In the case of the two rooms, the most significant for television, the living room and the bedroom do not differ significantly from the channel preferences. Consumption of general entertainment channels accounts for a higher-than-average 24% share of kitchen TV viewing, but the proportion of time spent watching public service and news channels is also remarkably high.


About Nielsen Audience Measurement
provide a “common currency” to television companies, agencies and advertisers on a daily basis based on an independent and transparent system. The independence, professional reliability and credibility of our company’s audience measurement has been confirmed by several different, independent evaluations and audits.

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