Streaming’s Unlikeliest Success Is a 60-Year-Old Soap Opera

In a streaming world filled with original series consisting of just 10 to 13 episodes per season, one show is making its mark with a higher-volume approach.

Days of Our Lives, the 60-year-old NBC soap opera which Peacock made exclusive to streaming in 2022, exhibits steady daily viewership across hundreds of modestly budgeted episodes. Season 60 has appeared on Luminate’s Top 50 Streaming Original TV Shows for 31 out of its 32 weeks of release.

When Seasons 59 and 60’s viewership for 2024 is combined (Days seasons run August-to-August), the title’s audience is roughly equal to that of Peacock’s top hit, Love Island USA, and leaves Peacock’s other 2024 originals in the dust.

This isn’t a knock on Peacock’s streaming originals. For context, courtesy of Luminate’s Streaming Viewership (M) data, Days of Our Lives – Season 60 has more minutes watched since release than Severance – Season 2 (Apple TV+), A Man on the Inside (Netflix), Only Murders in the Building – Season 4 (Hulu/Disney+), The Lord of the Rings: The Rings of Power – Season 2 (Prime Video) and The Pitt (Max), among other current originals that generate far more media attention.

Yes, that viewership is across Season 60’s 156 episodes (and counting), which run anywhere from 30 to 45 minutes, so perhaps it’s not the most fair comparison. But it gets to the core of why streaming consumption is measured in minutes in the first place: engagement is key. While Days of Our Lives might not drive as many new subscriptions as something like Severance, it keeps its audience watching the service and, importantly, consuming ads when using Peacock’s ad-supported tier. 

While Netflix and others spend big on premium scripted originals, Peacock has often taken a different approach. They focus spending on major sports programming like Sunday Night Football, Premier League and the Olympics (recently extended to 2036 in a $3 billion deal). In prior Streaming Watch newsletters, we’ve analyzed how these must-see live events drive new subscribers to Peacock’s smaller stable of streaming originals. 

Once subscribers join Peacock — often from these major events — the value lies in the hours and hours of exclusive library titles like The Office, Yellowstone and Bravo’s extensive catalog of unscripted TV. Sustained engagement is crucial for the success of Peacock’s ad tier. 

In Days of Our Lives, Peacock has an original series that is capable of generating value more akin to licensed programming while also giving audiences a reason to return to the platform on a daily basis. It’s a unique approach for streaming that Peacock’s rivals could learn from, reviving intellectual property from an overlooked TV genre still capable of delivering audiences despite its age.