xHamster Forecasts “Major Shift” In Adult Content Consumption

In its annual trend report, xHamster asserts that the “adult industry is changing rapidly – perhaps more quickly than in 2007, which saw both the launch of the iPhone and the birth of sites like xHamster.”

The crux of this prediction is a shift xHamster has observed in the porn consumption habits of “Generation Z” when compared to its predecessors, reaching back to the Baby Boomers.

“While 2019 saw the continued rise in women viewers and censorship fights across the globe, 2020 will be the year that Gen Z flexes its porn muscle, shifting millennials as the dominant force shaping what gets made, and how it gets consumed,” xHamster states in its report.

While the search trend data included in the report is interesting, the section on the age distribution of xHamster users versus xHamster Live (the brand’s cam division) users may be of greater salience to adult industry entrepreneurs – at least if one assumes the xHamster data is reflective of the adult industry at large.

“In the past few years, we’ve seen a steady decline in the number of 18-24 year olds coming to xHamster, even as the overall traffic has grown,” the report states. “Some of this could be ascribed to aging millennials moving out of the demographic. But when we looked at data from xHamster Live, we noticed something different. Cam fans are significantly younger than their tube site counterparts.”

The data leads xHamster to conclude that cam users “skew much younger – dramatically so.”

“Generation Z – the so-called Digital Natives – expect and crave interaction,” the report adds. “From video games to Twitch to FaceTime, they’re used to live media that engages with them. For this emerging generation, which now fully compromises the 18-24 demographic, live cam content dominates.”

According to xHamster, the data also refutes “the conventional wisdom that younger generations won’t pay for adult content.”

“Almost half – 48% – of all sales on xHamster Premium are made by users under the age of 35, even though they make up only 45% of total visits,” the report states. “Meanwhile, those users aged 45 and over accounted for only 18% of sales, even though they made up 23% of total visits. In other words, younger millennials and Gen Z purchase porn at a higher rate than the Boomers.”

While the report doesn’t detail how xHamster determines the age of viewers, searchers and purchasers, assuming their demographic analysis is accurate, this data should come as some solace to those in the adult industry who have anticipated nothing but a declining willingness on the part of consumers to pay for adult content.

That optimism comes with a caveat, of course: To take advantage of Generation Z’s willingness to buy, you have to offer content – and a user experience – that meets their expectations.

“We fully expect that as Gen Z comes of age and has disposable income, they will be more willing to spend money for quality adult content, which often means custom content and live cams,” xHamster says in its report.

To read the full report and additional analysis from xHamster, click here.