Most popular movies and shows on Netflix and TV in South Africa

Many South African households who use conventional broadcast TV are keen local soapie and drama watchers, while those streaming on Netflix have a more diverse pallet.

That is according to the latest TV viewership statistics from the Broadcasting Research Council of South Africa’s (BRCSA’s) Television Audience Measurements and Netflix’s Top 10 lists of most popular movies and TV series.

Video streaming has gained traction in South Africa in the past few years as broadband connectivity has grown and higher bandwidth connections have become more affordable.

With prices starting from as little as R29 per month, mobile-only subscription plans also make it more affordable for lower-income households to start enjoying movies and TV shows delivered via the Internet.

Nonetheless, the peak viewership numbers from conventional TV broadcasting are still well above the subscriber numbers of video streaming services.

For example, the most-watched episode of South Africa’s most popular soap — Uzalo — drew over 5.29 million viewers on 29 February 2024.

Netflix, the most popular video streaming service in South Africa, was estimated to have roughly 1.31 million local subscribers by late 2023, according to research by Omdia.

Nine of the top 10 most-watched programmes on conventional TV had over double that number during their peak viewership in February 2024.

In terms of channels with the most viewers, SABC 1 and E-tv were the only ones that had programmes in the top 10 — each with five placements to their names.

Aside from Uzalo, the other six top-performing programmes were also local soaps or long-running dramas.

Another interesting trend from this month’s stats was that viewership of the most-watched programming typically peaked around the end of the month.

One standout broadcast was the Powerball draw of 16 February 2024, showing many hopefuls tuned in to see if they could win the R30 million main jackpot.

The table below summarises the top 10 most-watched TV broadcasts in South Africa in February 2024.

Netflix does not share precise viewership numbers on a regular basis.

Instead, it only ranks its top 10 most-watched TV shows and movies weekly on its Netflix Tudum website. This includes breakdowns for every market where it operates, including South Africa.

For the latest reported week, from 1 to 7 April 2024, the first season of the docudrama series Testament: The Story of Moses was the most popular show. It has been in the Top 10 shows for two weeks.

The show’s popularity makes sense, considering that 85.3% of the South African population identified as Christian in the 2022 Census. A further 1.6% are Muslim and 0.1% Jewish — two other Abrahamic religions that also have the story of Moses in their religious texts.

The second and third most popular shows were Guy Ritchie’s The Gentlemen and South African crime drama Redemption. The former has been in the top 10 for five weeks, while the latter debuted in the top 10 ranking last week.

Regarding movies, Finnish historical action thriller Sisu jumped to the #1 spot in its first week in the top 10.

Another South African production — Heart of the Hunter — took the #2 spot, while (dubbed) French film The Wages of Fear placed third.

Overall, Netflix’s top 10 movie and TV show rankings consisted of titles from a much wider range of genres than the top 10 most-watched programmes on South African TV in February 2024, including crime dramas, documentaries, reality programming, standup comedy, scripted comedy, children’s content, and thrillers.

The tables below summarise Netflix’s top 10 most-watched movies and TV shows in South Africa between 20 and 26 November 2023.

Most popular Netflix TV shows

Most popular Netflix movies