SEOUL (ANN/THE KOREA HERALD) – During the latter half of 2023, Korean content emerged as the most-watched among non-English shows on Netflix, as revealed in a report by the streaming giant.
In “What We Watched: A Netflix Engagement Report” released recently, it was disclosed that approximately 30 per cent of Netflix viewing was attributed to non-English content.
The report highlighted that Korean (nine per cent), Spanish (seven per cent), and Japanese (five per cent) titles garnered the largest viewership outside of English.
Noteworthy Korean series included JTBC’s romantic drama “King the Land” (2023), Netflix originals “Mask Girl” (2023), and “Celebrity” (2023), accumulating 33 million, 18.5 million, and 18.3 million views, respectively.
Netflix clarified that views were calculated by dividing the total hours viewed by the runtime of the content.
On a global scale, the live-action adaptation of the anime “One Piece: Season 1” led with 71 million views, followed by the German miniseries “Dear Child” (52 million views), and Netflix’s original “Who is Erin Carter?” (50.1 million views).
Within the genre of Korean films, Netflix’s original “Ballerina” garnered the highest viewership with 36.2 million views, trailed by another Netflix original, “Believer 2” (15.6 million views), and “Pinkfong & Baby Shark’s Space Adventure” (15 million views).
On a global scale, Netflix’s science fiction film “Leave the World Behind,” featuring Julia Roberts and Ethan Hawke, amassed the highest views (121 million), followed by Netflix’s original “Heart of Stone” (109 million) and the animation film “Leo” (96 million).
These statistics underscore the sustained popularity of Korean content on the international streaming platform.
“It’s highly significant that Korean content accounted for nearly 10 per cent of all non-English title viewings, considering non-English titles consist of content from a number of countries around the world,” said pop culture critic Jung Ji-wook.
Things are not looking so bright for Korean content this year.
“Korean content on Netflix experienced a decline in performance during the first half of 2024. To enhance its performance, Korean content creators should avoid producing content where the plot remains largely unchanged with only the cast changing,” Jung added.
Meanwhile, Netflix owned 15 per cent of the Korean content surveyed in the report released Friday. The report analysed the data of content streamed on Netflix in the latter half of 2023, with more than 50,000 viewing hours.
In April 2023, Netflix co-CEO Sarandos announced that Netflix would invest USD2.5 billion in Korean content over the next four years at a meeting with President Yoon Suk Yeol held during Yoon’s US state visit.
