‘Beckham’ & ‘Squid Game: The Challenge’ Lead Netflix’s Unscripted Charge In Latest Data Dump; How Do They Compare To ‘Love Is Blind’?
The numbers are in and Beckham and Squid Game: The Challenge have topped the charts in terms of Netflix viewership when it comes to non-scripted titles.
The two series, a docuseries and reality competition, were the seventh and 15th most-watched non-scripted shows to debut in the second half of 2023, respectively.
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But as Netflix continues to delve into the docuseries genre and ramp up its reality offerings, how do these shows compare to top shows from its previous data dump, in particular Love Is Blind.
Firstly, it’s complicated.
Beckham, which told the story of the former Manchester United legend’s career, debuted in October and scored 43.9M views. This was as a result of only being four parts.
Squid Game: The Challenge, the reality series based on the dystopian scripted series, secured 271M views across the period after its launch at the end of November. But that series, which was produced by Studio Lambert and The Garden, was ten parts.
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Netflix counts views as hours viewed divided by runtime.
One of the challenges of comparing it to Netflix’s previous viewership release is that last time around the streamer only revealed the number of hours watched.
Using this metric, Beckham totaled 209M hours and Squid Game: The Challenge totaled 271M hours.
This puts both shows behind the fourth season of Love Is Blind, which totaled 230M hours watched after its launch in March 2023.
The Kinetic Content-produced dating show’s fifth season, which launched in September 2023, drew 156M hours viewed, down from its fourth season, with 14M views. Season five, however, was only 11 episodes, including its reunion special, while season four was 16 episodes including its reunion special and “After the Alter” episodes.
Other unscripted highlights for the six months between July and December 2023, include Depp V Heard, which scored 77M hours viewed and 31.7M views, while Life on Our Planet received 131M hours viewed and 18.9M views.
Season two of true-crime series Murdaugh Murders: A Southern Scandal was watched for 31M hours after its September release, compared to season one’s 105M after its February 2023 release. Both seasons were three episodes long.
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