Americans Watched Over 58 BILLION Minutes Of ‘The Office’ In 2020, Perhaps Explaining Our Precipitous Decline In Intelligence

The Office Best of Michael Scott moments tribute compilation

Don’t get me wrong: I’ve crushed The Office multiple times and have enjoyed every single rewatch. It’s unquestionably one of the greatest comedy series of the 21st century.

But this widespread obsession with the series — you know, those memes that make fun of people who think liking The Office qualifies as a personality trait — is far too overblown, especially when considering that it’s not even the best NBC sitcom of the last two decades (that title, of course, belongs to Parks and Recreation).

My own personal opinion about The Office isn’t the only piece of evidence, though, as these recently released streaming statistics from Nielsen reveal that Americans watched a combined 58 BILLION minutes of the series in 2020 alone (now wonder Peacock is building their entire brand around it), which would perhaps explain the rapid decline of intelligence in this nation (among other things).

Last year, Americans cumulatively streamed more than 57 billion minutes of The Office, the comedy favorite that originally aired for nine seasons on NBC, on Netflix, according to figures released Tuesday by Nielsen.

The next-biggest show was past seasons of Grey’s Anatomy, also on Netflix, with an estimated 39.4 billion minutes streamed. Indeed, Netflix had a lock on the top 10 most-viewed licensed TV shows, per Nielsen, with past seasons of Criminal Minds, NCIS, Schitt’s Creek, Supernatural, Shameless, New Girl, The Blacklist and Vampire Diaries. [via Variety]

As for the streaming series that Nielson tracked, Netflix unsurprisingly claimed nine of the top ten spots, with Ozark taking first place, followed by Lucifer, The Crown, and Tiger King. At number five is the only non-Netflix series, Disney+’s The Mandalorian, which is then followed by Netflix’s The Umbrella Academy, The Great British Baking Show, Boss Baby: Back in Business, Longmire, and You.

Nielsen also released streaming data on the Top 10 most-watched movies, which was split between Netflix and Disney+: Frozen II, Moana, The Secret Life of Pets 2 (Netflix), Onward, and Dr. Seuss’ The Grinch (Netflix) make up the Top 5, followed by Hamilton, Spenser Confidential (Netflix), Aladdin, Toy Story 4, and Zootopia.

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Eric Italiano BroBIble avatar
Eric Italiano is a NYC-based writer who spearheads BroBible's Pop Culture and Entertainment content. He covers topics such as Movies, TV, and Video Games, while interviewing actors, directors, and writers.