Every week, television channels in India look closely at one set of numbers: TV ratings. These numbers decide how much advertisers pay and which shows survive. In India, TV viewership is measured by the Broadcast Audience Research Council (BARC India).
What BARC is
BARC India is an industry body set up in 2015 by broadcasters, advertisers and advertising agencies, through their associations. It works under policy guidelines for television rating agencies issued by the Ministry of Information and Broadcasting in 2014, which the ministry has reviewed in later years.
How viewing is measured
BARC installs meters, called BAR-O-Meters, in a sample of households across urban and rural India. The sample is chosen to represent the country’s TV watching population.
- Each channel carries an inaudible watermark in its audio.
- The meter detects the watermark and records which channel is on.
- Family members press a button on a remote to register who is watching, so the data shows age and gender too.
The data is collected, checked and released every week.
What the numbers mean
BARC reports viewership mainly in impressions, which are the number of people (in thousands) who watched a programme or channel, averaged over minutes. These are used to rank shows and channels by genre, language and region.
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Why ratings matter
- Advertisers use ratings to decide where to place ads and how much to pay.
- Channels use them to schedule and renew shows.
- Ratings influence what content gets made.
Concerns and safeguards
In 2020, allegations of tampering with sample households led to police cases and a pause in news channel ratings for several months. Since then, BARC has added more safeguards, and the government has looked at ways to make measurement more robust, including more meters and new technology.
Revealing the identity of panel homes or influencing them is not allowed. BARC asks the public not to share such information.
Changing viewing habits
With OTT platforms and connected TVs, viewing is spreading across screens. BARC and other agencies have been working on ways to measure viewing on digital platforms and smart TVs.
Bottom line
TV ratings in India are measured by BARC through meters in sample homes. They shape advertising money and programming, which is why protecting the panel is so important.
Source / स्रोत: Broadcast Audience Research Council, Ministry of Information and Broadcasting, TRAI
