The Year Ahead In Numbers

8,294,400
The number of pixels on a UHD “4K” TV. This is slightly less than 4K actually (3840 x 2160 rather than 4096 x 2160), but what’s a few pixels between friends?! As we saw at CES, UHDTV is a big trend for the year ahead and it will be interesting to see if the rest of the industry – content creators, broadcasters, online platforms, or indeed consumers, can keep pace with the output of the TV manufacturers.

60
The number of frames per second (fps) supported for UHDTV Phase 1 (ratified in 2014). Larger screens with more pixels will demonstrate motion blur at lower frame rates and the number of frames required to reduce this to an acceptable level varies depending on the content itself. Fast moving action, such as sport, may require 120 fps and some experts suggest rates of up to 600 fps to produce optimal results. The next iteration of UHD (Phase 2) will likely support up to 120 fps. All of this comes at a cost of course – more bandwidth for content distribution and disappointment for those who have bought a first generation UHD TV if they can’t support those higher rate broadcasts in the future.

1000
The number of nits you will probably want in a HDR capable TV. “Number of whats”, I hear you say? Nits are a unit of measurement for the amount of brightness emitted and today’s average sets produce about 100 nits. This is quite low (a 100 watt light bulb produces about 18,000 nits) and so the contrast available on today’s TVs does a poor job of representing the real world. This is why HDR TVs look so spectacular as they provide a much greater range between dark and light. Many are arguing that 4K is much less impactful than HDR, with some arguing for HDR HD instead, but the combination of the two is certainly impressive.

6,000,000,000
Number of hours of video viewed on YouTube each month and growing. Netflix streams about 2 billion hours a month. The volume of online video viewing will continue to grow strongly in 2015 as our viewing habits evolve.

1,400,000,000
The number of smartphones predicted to be sold in 2015. With video being one of the common uses for such devices, and the smartphone being the primary screen for viewers in some demographics and locations, what will this mean for television and television content itself in the future?

9,000,000
The rumoured cost in US dollars, per episode, to make the new Netflix exclusive TV series, Marco Polo, making it one of the most expensive TV productions in history. If content is indeed King then making it is not necessarily cheap.

33,794,976
The number of subscribers to the Swedish vlogger PewDiePie’s YouTube channel as of last week. By last month his channel had received 7.2 billion views making it the most popular channel in YouTube history and well ahead of more established brands and celebrities. Such channels have become big business in 2014 and this year will likely see that trend continue at pace.

28,109
The number of days since John Logie Baird made the world’s first colour television broadcast, sending a mechanically scanned 120-line image across London. I wonder what he would make of “television” in 2015?

Steve Plunkett, Chief Technology Officer.