TV streaming records were broken in 2023, with some surprising shows named as the most streamed in the U.S. last year, according to media audience measuring firm Nielsen.
In Nielsen’s new report tracking American streaming habits over the year, Suits was crowned a winner as 2023’s most popular TV show on streaming.
Suits beat a previous record held by NBC’s The Office, which was streamed for 57.1 billion minutes in 2020. Despite running from 2011 to 2019, Aaron Korsh’s legal drama saw a massive resurgence in viewership last year, being streamed a whopping 57.7 billion minutes on Netflix after it was added to the platform in June last year. The series famously saw the screen breakthrough role of Meghan Markle, Duchess of Sussex.
The second most-streamed show of last year was the animated children’s hit Bluey, clocking up 43.9 billion minutes on Disney+.
Other older sitcoms and dramas comprise much of the rest of the most-streamed list: the rest of it, successively, is NCIS, Grey’s Anatomy, Cocomelon, The Big Big Theory, Gilmore Girls, Friends, Heartland, and Supernatural. Four of the 10 ten most streamed TV shows on the list are currently on Netflix exclusively, while other three titles stream on Netflix and a few other platforms – like Suits, which appears on both Netflix and Peacock.
None of the top 10 streamed shows originally aired on the streaming platforms where they took off in 2023, which is notable given the year was dominated by the Hollywood writers strikes. However, Apple TV+’s Ted Lasso garnered the most viewership for an original series, with 16.9 million minutes for its third and final season. Netflix’s The Night Agent, Ginny and Georgia, Virgin River, and Love Is Blind rounded out the top five originals. But none of these shows, including Ted Lasso, were in the overall top streamed list.
Of course, just because something’s popular doesn’t make it…good. Here’s Mashable’s picks for the best TV shows of 2023, regardless of their viewership numbers.