"Soap fatigue" - why we're turning off our traditional TV favourites

Unbelievable as it may seem now, a massive 30 million people watched Dirty Den serve his wife Angie with divorce papers in the Christmas Day episode of EastEnders in 1986 – over half the population. Yet this Christmas, when six-times married Gail (Helen Worth) finally left Coronation Street after 50 years – in yet another bridal car – the audience didn’t hit 2.5 million.

Soaps have been steadily losing viewers since those 1980s glory days, and it’s no different among Saga customers.

According to our survey of 2,697, aged from 50 to 100, 30% watch or listen to soaps (35% of women, 24% of men).

However, 47% used to tune in but no longer do – and the younger you are, the more likely to switch off.

Why? Half say they’re not interested in the storylines, 47% say soaps are too unrealistic/dramatic, 46% say they’re out of the habit, and 42% say they prefer other types of shows.

More people, for instance, watched The Weakest Link this Christmas than Gail’s Corrie exit (above), which wasn’t even in the day’s top ten.

Those reasons all ring true for Scott Bryan, who co-hosts the Must Watch podcast on BBC Sounds. He senses a touch of ‘soap fatigue’ among many viewers – and experiments with one-hour episodes have only made that worse.

But the most significant factor, he feels, is the explosion of choice: in 1986 we only had four channels; now we have dozens.

“I think, as a result, we’ve lost the habit of watching soaps,” says Scott. And the ability to watch at any time has taken away those communal ‘ooh’ moments.

As the legendary EastEnders writer Tony Jordan once pointed out: “Soaps were the original fomo – you were afraid of missing out. That’s how we got audiences upwards of 26 million.”

Tastes have evolved, too. Traditional daytime genres like cooking, antiques and quiz shows have muscled in on evening slots and ticked the same ‘comfort viewing’ box. Reality TV – a kind of soap, really – provides the ‘ooh’ moments.

“We’ve also seen a huge uptick in expensive premium dramas, costing ten times more per episode,” says Scott. Ultimately, that results in less money for soaps, and possibly higher expectations of production quality from viewers.

But, he believes, it would be presumptuous to predict the end of soaps, adding, “they are still some of the most recognisable and familiar shows in the country.”

The favourite soaps of Saga customers

• Coronation Street, is top with 51% of soap-watchers tuning in.
• Emmerdale and Radio 4’s The Archers are joint second on 31%.
• EastEnders on 27%.

The now-finished Doctors is next on 11%, Neighbours is on 5%, and Home and Away and Hollyoaks are on 2% each.

Half a century of soaps

Saga’s soap fans are as loyal to their shows as East End matriarch Peggy Mitchell was to her ‘faaaamily’.

More than a quarter (26%) have been watching for 50+ years – and six in ten for 30+ years. And men are just as likely as women to be in it for the long haul.

Four in ten soap fans never miss an episode, and five in ten watch/listen to most episodes in the week. One in ten (11%) has even visited the set of their favourite show. 

Why we watch soaps

• For 50% it's the habit of tuning in that they enjoy.
• The escapism is a draw for 31%.
• 36% love the dramatic storylines .
• And 67% watch their soaps at the time of broadcast.

Perhaps it’s a blessing in disguise that soaps didn’t feature at all in the top ten most-watched TV programmes of 2024 based on overnight data (football was first and third).

One survey found that happiness levels declined by 4% after watching soaps, whereas comedy increased happiness by 22% (the Gavin & Stacey finale was second in the top ten, with Wallace & Gromit: Vengeance Most Fowl fourth) and music shows by 17% (The Eurovision Song Contest was sixth).

Maybe we have come to realise Dirty Den’s not good for us after all.