According to a report by data analytics provider Apptopia, older Americans have spent 90 minutes on average watching the 2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics on their smartphones.
In the first 10 days of streaming the Winter Olympics on Peacock (CMCSA), viewership on mobile compared to previous Olympic events was lower, but the watch time of the audience was longer, the report said.
2026 Milan-Cortina Winter Olympics snapshot (Apptopia)
“Comparing the past three Olympic Games on Peacock, Average Time Spent per DAU is up for all age groups for these Winter Games, with the exception of the 36-45 bracket,” Apptopia said. “Older users, those aged 46+, saw the largest increase over the Summer 2024 games, at 48.5%. They are watching more than 90 minutes of Olympic coverage a day on their phones.”
When compared to the Summer Olympics, daily active users for the Winter event are down 9%.
However, the surge in DAUs from Day 1 to Day 10 was a whopping 92% for the Winter Olympics this year, which is much higher than the 35% rise for Winter 2022 and the 27% jump for Summer 2024 for the same duration.
Apptopia found that about 27% of users who watched the Winter Olympics on Peacock were new and had never had a session on the app before, and about 23% were “resurrected users,” or those who had “churned” but re-engaged for the event. The remaining 50% were already active users on the streaming platform.
“This means the Winter Games functioned less as a pure acquisition play and more as a full-funnel lifecycle tool, reactivating lapsed subscribers while deepening engagement among the existing base,” said Apptopia Director Adam Blacker.