Nigeria Launches New TV Audience Measurement System, Offers 36GB Free Data Monthly
- The FG began the first phase of its national Audience Measurement System in Lagos on Tuesday
- Selected households will receive 36GB of free data monthly, valued at about N11,000, for taking part in the programme
- The NBC-led rollout will use Peoplemeter devices to track viewing patterns, replacing Nigeria's old diary-based measurement system
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The Federal Government has kicked off the first phase of its national Audience Measurement System (AMS) in Lagos, with participating households set to receive 36GB of free mobile data every month as part of the scheme.
The National Broadcasting Commission (NBC) announced the initiative under its FreeTV brand at a press briefing in Lagos on Tuesday, September 1
Source: Getty Images
The programme will deploy Peoplemeter technology to automatically track television viewing habits in selected homes, replacing the manual diary-based system Nigeria has relied on for years.
How the Programme Works
Peoplemeter devices and data-enabled routers will be installed in participating households to capture viewing information and transmit it daily to a central data centre.
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Homes are being selected from Nigeria's first nationwide Establishment Survey, completed in the first half of 2023, which covered 60,000 households across all 36 states and the Federal Capital Territory, including 7,000 in Lagos, the Sun reports.
Patrick Gomes, Chief Operating Officer of First Media and Entertainment Integrated Limited, the technical partner behind the system, said the monthly data incentive is currently worth about N11,000 and is meant to support participating households' internet needs.
He added that a quarterly incentive tied to compliance levels would also be introduced.
Gomes said:
"So we do not just look at monthly data, but we also want to add a quarterly incentive for the level of compliance they deliver."
The Lagos rollout follows a technical testing phase and a proof-of-concept pilot whose results were presented to stakeholders in Abuja in the second quarter of 2024.
NBC and FG Back the Initiative
NBC Director-General Charles Ebuebu called the rollout a turning point for Nigeria's broadcasting sector, saying the system would deliver accurate, passive tracking of audience behaviour while tackling long-standing transparency problems in the advertising and broadcasting markets.
BusinessDay reports that the Minister of Information and National Orientation, Mohammed Idris, represented at the briefing by Advertising Regulatory Council of Nigeria Director-General Olalekan Fadolapo, said the system sits alongside broader broadcasting modernisation efforts including the Digital Switch Over.
The Minister said.
"A reliable audience measurement system can strengthen investor confidence, support the production of quality Nigerian content and create opportunities across our media and creative industries."
He added that the data generated would be vital across the industry.
He said:
"At its core, AMS helps us better understand our audiences: who is watching, what they are watching, and when they are watching. This information is vital to broadcasters, advertisers, content producers, investors and regulators."
Source: Getty Images
Three-Phase National Rollout
The Lagos deployment is the first of three planned phases.
The second will extend coverage to Abuja, Port Harcourt and Kano, while the third phase will reach other major media markets across Nigeria's six geopolitical zones.
The AMS rollout comes on the heels of the FreeTV platform launch in June 2026, which gave Nigerian households access to over 100 television channels at no monthly cost as part of the country's ongoing migration from analogue to digital broadcasting.
FG announces deadline for final analogue TV switch-off
Earlier, Legit.ng reported that the federal government has announced December 2028 as the target date for completing the country's full transition from analogue to digital television broadcasting.
This follows the launch of a new free-to-air platform called FreeTV.
Ebuebu also said the commission's audience measurement work is moving forward.
Source: Legit.ng
