While some analysts have questioned the ongoing economic viability of broacast-TV late night shows amid ongoing declines in linear viewing, new data from Tubular Labs suggests that these shows are still thriving on social media and that their future may lie in adopting a “social media-first” strategy.

Tubular reported that since the start of 2025, late-night broadcast shows like “Saturday Night Live,“ “Jimmy Kimmel Live!,” “The Late Show With Stephen Colbert,” “Late Night With Seth Meyers” and “The Tonight Show Starring Jimmy Fallon” have combined for more than 17 billion views across social video platforms. Fifty-six different videos from late-night TV had at least 25 million views.

Declines in late night TV audiences has been cited as a major factor in the cancellation of CBS’s “The Late Show with Stephen Colbert” after published reports citing anonymous sources claimed the show was losing $40 million or more a year.

Tubular’s data seems to offer a counter-narrative to that view. It shows audiences are gravitating towards on-demand monologues and viral segments they can consume and share on their own time, instead of staying up late to watch live.

Of the most-watched social videos from these shows, Tubular reported, several were uploaded in October, including this Jimmy Fallon clip that racked up 51.6 million views on TikTok in just a few days after its release.

"SNL", despite questions of relevance over the last decade as streaming comedy grows, accounts for 14 videos of 25 million-plus views on its own. That included the top late-night video of the year: a skit featuring Pete Davidson and Timothée Chalamet that racked up over 63 million views, the researchers reported.

That might indicate these shows should be adopting a social-media first strategy for their future, given that these videos have massive reach, and even better opportunities for audience targeting than traditional TV, Tubular Labs reported.

The researchers also stressed that when “Jimmy Kimmel Live!” returned to the air in September, much was made about its TV ratings. Yet, as YouTube itself pointed out in the immediate aftermath, the bigger number was actually around Kimmel’s return monologue video on the platform. That clip has 22.7 million views, and is Kimmel’s most-seen video of 2025.

SAN FRANCISCO—New data from Tubular Labs shows that minutes watched of content from U.S. news organizations on social media increased dramatically, with NBC News seeing a 53% increase in minutes to 1 billion in October. 

Meanwhile Fox News was up 45% in minutes watched to 674 million and CBS News increased minutes watched on social media by 37% to 165 million minutes.

Tubular also found that as interest in the news category spiked last month, minutes-watched increased far more than unique viewership. This could indicate that U.S. news audiences on social video are a more static group whose watch-time ebbs and flows based on current events, the researchers said. 

Fox News and MSNBC were the only major TV news networks to gain unique U.S. viewers, up by 34% and 23% respectively in October.

Despite the viewership fluctuations, most outlets saw a significant increase in minutes watched, attributed to extensive coverage of the Gaza conflict, early 2024 presidential election news, and U.S. Speaker of the House votes. 

SAN FRANCISCO—New data from Tubular Labs indicates that short videos under 60 seconds in length are the best performing content on YouTube that originates from the top five U.S. broadcast and cable properties. 

The new Tubular Labs study found that shorts accounted for 34.8% of YouTube views for the top five U.S. broadcast and cable properties from Sept. 2022 through April 2023, up from 27% during the same period from 2021 to 2022.

In contrast to the growing viewing share of shorts on YouTube from the major broadcast and cable networks, videos running 20 minutes or longer accounted for just 9% of views for these companies in that stretch, vs. 11.6% the year before.

The new findings are notable in the run-up to the Upfronts. As brands continue to shift traditional TV ad dollars to digital video, these metrics from Tubular Labs could aid buyers and sellers with omnichannel media buys across the video landscape with insights on how video from major broadcast and cable properties performs on social media. 

The data also provides unique insight into the content life cycle, and shows how certain shows or content categories may have longer staying power with specific audiences, the researchers said. 

In contrast to the growing viewing share of shorts on YouTube from the major broadcast and cable networks, videos running 20 minutes or longer accounted for just 9% of views for these companies in that stretch, vs. 11.6% the year before.

The study also found that TV News and Telenovelas saw higher viewership compared to a year earlier. 

TV news shows climbed significantly in YouTube viewership this TV season, up from just 3.5% in the 2021-22 TV season time range, to 8.9% in the 2022-23 stretch. 

Telenovelas also were seen to skyrocket, as views around these programs increased nearly 21x year-over-year for these media companies. 

In contrast, talk shows and reality TV content both showed year-over-year decreases in share of TV show-related views, with talk shows seeing 15.7% of views (down from 22.1% in 2021-22) and reality TV pulling in 10.3% of views (down from 13.7% the previous year), the company reported. 

Basketball continued its lead as the dominant sporting category on YouTube, accounting for 37% of sports-related video views for the top five U.S. broadcast and cable companies, up from 29.7% the year prior, the study found. 

Other increases were seen in soccer videos –  with the World Cup helping grow videos significantly year-over-year, from 11% of sports videos to 20.4% in 2022-23 – and combat sports that saw nearly a 3% increase from 4.6% of sports views year-over-year across top broadcast media creators, Tubular Labs reported. 

The researchers examined YouTube views with a U.S. audience for the top five U.S. broadcast media properties from Sept. 2022 - Aug. 2023, including Fox Corp., Comcast, The Walt Disney Co., Paramount and Warner Bros. Discovery.

More information is available at www.tubularlabs.com. 

NEW YORK—Digital video measurement company Tubular Labs on Tuesday, Sept. 10, introduced new metrics for social video that are based on time spent viewing and de-duplicated audience engagement.

The new metrics are designed to provide a more TV-like measurement of attention and unique reach for social video globally.

“Technology has made audiences global, mobile and social, but the current measurement products are country-specific, often missing mobile, and are seriously lacking in social coverage—leading to confusion and locked economics for online video,” said Rob Gabel, founder and CEO at Tubular Labs. “Our vision is to drive the same transparency in global social video that the industry already has for radio, TV and websites, delivering key insights that change the way both media and brands transact on video.”

Media buyers are looking for an apple to apple way to measure and compare video from platform to platform, whether traditional TV, digital video, over-the-top or social.

Tubular said that the lack of comparable metrics for social video has limited the amount of revenue publishers can earn, despite the trillions of views social video generates.

The new time-based video measurement approach was co-developed with a consortium of online publishers through the Global Video Measurement Alliance, and its members Viacom, Ellen Digital Network, Corus Entertainment, Vice, BuzzFeed, Group Nine and Media Chain; new to the group this fall are Discovery and Brut.

“Working with our GVMA members and early access customers, we are rapidly making progress to commercialize and release our new measures that will reveal a comprehensive picture of global audience reach and engagement for social video, bringing long-needed parity to the industry’s accepted linear standards” said Neil Patil, chief commercial officer at Tubular Labs. “This will include standardized time-based views across platforms, true global de-duplicated reach, total watch time, average watch time per unique viewer, audience demographics and location, and special reporting features.” 

This story originally appeared on TVT's sister publication B&C.