Global Media Intelligence 2019: Mexico

Key Features

Like Colombia, Mexico offers a glimpse into the future of digital consumption in Latin America, especially as robust, affordable connections and services reach more of the population.

• Traditional media formats are popular in Mexico, but several of those audiences are slowly shrinking. More than three-quarters of internet users ages 16 to 64 had listened to broadcast radio in the month prior to polling in Q1 2019, according to GlobalWebIndex/Publicis Media. Some 58.6% had read a print newspaper, and 55.4% had read a print magazine. Radio and print magazine penetration had declined marginally since Q1 2018. Engagement with traditional media—except TV—remained highest among males, internet users in urban areas and those in the top 25% of households, ranked by income.
• In H1 2019, 87.8% of Mexico’s internet users had watched broadcast TV in the prior month. Notably, the proportion of internet users saying they had watched films or TV shows via subscription video-on-demand (SVOD) services such as Netflix climbed to 86.9% —within 1 percentage point of the share watching live broadcast TV. But that likely reflects the urban and younger skew of the survey population (see note below).
• Between H1 2018 and H1 2019, smart TV penetration had risen from 52.4% to 57.9%. Ownership was above average among the 35-to-54 age bracket, affluents and those living in urban areas.
• Overall, 95.0% of internet users said they had streamed video of some kind in the month prior to polling. Viewing of video-on-demand (VOD) correlated directly with age, being highest in the 16-to-24 cohort (96.6%) and significantly lower among those 45 to 54 (91.7%). But these were minor variations in a pattern that was otherwise very similar across all demographics.
• Digital audio consumption was also high in Mexico, at 87.6% of respondents in H1 2019. As with video, engagement with digital audio correlated broadly with age but was relatively constant across location and income levels.
• Social networking is a given for Mexico’s internet users, judging by the data. About 90% of respondents had used social media recently, and this varied little across demographic groups. Moreover, social networks consumed 3 hours, 15 minutes (3:15) daily, on average—the third-largest slice of media time. (GlobalWebIndex includes YouTube in its social media calculations, which tends to boost penetration and time spent.)