Cord-cutting in 2026: what the latest sources actually show

The latest cord cutting statistics show streaming took 49% of US TV viewing time in July 2026, according to Nielsen’s Gauge released September 10, 2026, up from 47.5% in December 2025. MoffettNathanson counts 61.5 million US homes paying for a TV bundle, including virtual services such as YouTube TV, as Sportico reported in September 2026.

What counts as cord-cutting

A cord-cutter is a household or person that used to pay for cable, satellite or telco TV and canceled it. They now watch through internet services, a broadcast antenna or both. A cord-never is someone who never subscribed in the first place.

The sources on this page measure different things, so their numbers can’t be combined:

• Nielsen’s The Gauge measures share of TV viewing time.
• MoffettNathanson counts homes that pay for a TV bundle.
• Charter reports its own video customers.

They sit side by side, but they can’t be added or subtracted into one cord-cutting number. Viewing share also says nothing direct about who pays for cable. A home can keep a cable subscription and still spend most of its TV time streaming.

The Gauge has its own method. Nielsen’s Gauge methodology notes say the figures combine two separately weighted panels. Streaming comes from Streaming Meter-enabled homes within the national TV panel, and broadcast, cable and total usage come from the overall TV panel. Each figure covers a broadcast month and uses Live+7 viewing, which counts live viewing plus linear viewing up to seven days later.

The latest cord-cutting figures by source

Each row is a separate measurement. Read the scope and method columns before you quote anything.

The July figure comes from TheWrap’s coverage of Nielsen’s July Gauge, and the reporting interval from Nielsen’s July 2026 Gauge release. The May figure is from Nielsen’s May 2026 Gauge, which put streaming at 48.6% (+1.0 point). April’s 47.6% is that change worked backward, and it matches the timing of Nielsen’s April 2026 Gauge reports. The quarterly figures come from Nielsen’s Q2 2026 Ad Supported Gauge. The household counts come from Sportico’s September 2026 report, and Charter’s count from Charter’s Q2 2026 results.

Each Gauge row is a single month, not a quarterly average. The Ad Supported Gauge is quarterly and uses a different denominator, ad-supported viewing rather than all viewing, so its 48.2% can’t be compared with the monthly streaming shares. For earlier dated readings, see the cord-cutting figures for Q2 2026.

What changed in the Gauge since December 2025

December 2025 set the baseline. Streaming reached 47.5% of TV time, which Nielsen’s December 2025 release called the largest share it had ever reported at the time. Christmas Day alone drew 55.1 billion streaming minutes.

The spring months stayed close to that level. April 2026 came in at 47.6%. Then May rose to 48.6%, and Nielsen described it as the start of streaming’s usual summer rise. In July, streaming reached 49%. Nielsen tied the month to the final weeks of the FIFA World Cup 2026 and streaming’s normal summer boost, and total TV usage rose 2.2% from June to July.

By subtraction, July sits 1.5 points above December. That gain is real, but read it with the calendar in mind. Summer schedules, holidays and major sports events push monthly shares up and down, and a handful of months don’t make a trend line. Compare a summer month with the same month a year earlier, not with a winter month, before drawing conclusions. The December baseline also appears in our Q4 2025 cord-cutting snapshot.

How many homes still pay for TV

The long-run decline in paying homes is large. MoffettNathanson estimates that about 31 million customers left cable, satellite or telco-TV providers over the last five years, a 44% drop. In Q2 2016, 97.3 million households subscribed to the bundle. Against that figure, the net loss is 57.2 million, or 59%. When virtual providers such as YouTube TV, Sling TV and Hulu/Fubo are counted, Sportico also reports that 61.5 million homes still pay, a 48% penetration rate.

There are signs the decline is slowing. MoffettNathanson reported that pay TV, including vMVPDs, added 303,000 net subscribers in Q3 2025, the first gain since 2017, according to Ars Technica’s report on the Cord-Cutting Monitor. The firm itself cautioned that the gain came in the year’s seasonally strongest quarter. Deadline’s coverage noted that the category was still down 5.8% year over year.

Charter’s numbers show the same easing at one large operator. Total video customers fell by 60,000 in Q1 2026, compared with 181,000 in Q1 2025, according to Charter’s Q1 2026 results. Charter credits simpler packaging and including programmers’ streaming apps in its video packages. In Q2 2026 the company lost 21,000 video customers, and it was down 107,000, or 0.8%, over twelve months. The Q1 detail is also in our Q1 2026 cord-cutting report.

For background on the slowdown question, see our earlier piece on whether cord-cutting is slowing down. Check the period and method of any household figure there before comparing it with the numbers above.

Why cord-cutting numbers disagree

Search for cord-cutting figures and you’ll find totals tens of millions apart. Usually the sources aren’t contradicting each other. They’re answering different questions:

• Different units. Viewing time, paying homes and one operator’s customers are three separate measures. How much time cord-cutters spend watching is its own question, covered in our look at how much TV cord-cutters watch.
• Different denominators. Some counts include only the traditional bundle, and others add virtual providers. MoffettNathanson’s own figures show the gap: 31% of homes pay for the traditional bundle, but 48% (61.5 million) pay when vMVPDs are included. Our YouTube TV usage figures cover the largest virtual service.
• Projections quoted as counts. A forecast for a year often gets repeated later as if someone counted it.
• Undated repeats. Deadline noted that MoffettNathanson’s Q3 2025 report didn’t size the total market, and that industry estimates ranged from 65 million to 70 million. Secondary sites often recycle ranges like that without saying when they were measured.

Before you put a cord-cutting number in a media plan, check four things:

1. What unit it counts (minutes, homes, adults or customers).
2. Which population it covers.
3. Which period it describes.
4. Whether it was measured or projected.

If a page can’t answer all four, find the original source or leave the number out.

What the shift means for TV advertisers

Viewing share shows where attention goes. It doesn’t show how much ad inventory exists, and it doesn’t guarantee a placement on any network or streaming service. Not all TV time carries ads either. In Q2 2026, ad-supported TV was 71.5% of total viewing, according to Nielsen’s Ad Supported Gauge, so close to three in ten viewing minutes were outside any advertiser’s reach.

The audience’s age changes the mix as well. Among all viewers aged 2 and older, streaming held 48.2% of ad-supported TV in Q2 2026. For adults 18 and older, Nielsen put streaming at 44.4%, with broadcast rising to 28.6% and cable to 27.0%. If your customers are adults, linear TV still holds a larger share of their ad-supported viewing than the headline streaming number suggests. If live events matter to your audience, see our figures on how sports fans stream.

The practical conclusion is narrower than the headlines. A cable-only plan misses many viewers, and a streaming-only plan may underweight older adults. Pairing streaming TV with search and social lets someone who sees a TV spot find you when they look you up. Our roundup of connected TV advertising statistics covers spend and format data.

Adwave creates ads from your website and runs them on TV, search, social and the web from one daily budget. Adwave’s pricing page lists daily budgets from $30 to $10,000 with no subscription. Which channels run depends on your budget and eligibility, and you can review your ads before adding a card. The Adwave FAQ states that Adwave doesn’t guarantee sales or a return on spend, because results depend on your offer, audience, budget, creative and website.

How these figures were checked and when they change

Each figure on this page comes from a named origin:

• Monthly streaming shares come from Nielsen’s Gauge releases. The July figure is as reported by TheWrap.
• Quarterly ad-supported shares come from Nielsen’s Ad Supported Gauge.
• Pay-TV household estimates come from MoffettNathanson, as reported by Sportico, Ars Technica and Deadline.
• Operator counts come from Charter’s quarterly results.

Estimates are labeled as estimates in the table, and the April share is marked as derived from Nielsen’s stated monthly change.

We recheck this page after each Gauge release. When a newer comparable month is confirmed, it goes into the table with its period, and older months stay for comparison. The page’s public dates change only when the figures change, not when a source is simply rechecked.