Freeview says its broadcasts now reach 226,000 or 14.1% of households, with adoption accelerating. Sky TV still has more than three times as many viewers overall. But in high definition reach, the race is too close to call.

Both Freeview and Sky TV now have their HD hardware in around 70,000 households.

Freeview’s penetration figure is based on the sale of standalone set-top boxes, plus sales of TVs with built-in decoders.

The free-to-air consortium, which launched in May 2007 and added its first HD channels in April last year, says it is now adding 10,000 households a month.

Of Freeview’s 226,000 installed base, 155,482 households are viewing its standard definition (SD) digital satellite service. The balance, 70,659, have decoders capable of receiving Freeview’s terrestrial high definition (HD) digital broadcasts.

With 70,659 HD households, Freeview is neck-and-heck with Sky TV which, as of the end of last year, said 51,485 its subscribers had upgraded to the HD version of its decoder, MySky HDi.

Sky TV chief executive John Fellet declined to provide an update on that figure today, but said say it was firmly on track to hit its goal of installing 80,000 MySky HDi decoders by June.

But is anybody watching?
Both sides smack talk the other’s figures.

Mr Fellet told NBR this morning that many buyers of HD TVs with built-in Freeview decoders ignored them in favour of watching Sky TV (both services can be viewed on the same set).

Departing Freeview GM Steve Browning has previously pointed to Sky TV’s own figures showing that only a minority of owners of MySky HDi pay a $10/month premium on their account to receive HD versions of the broadcasters’ channels. During the first half of 2008, just 13% of MySky HDi owners had paid to upgrade to the HD channels, according to Sky TV’s annual report. The broadcaster has declined to update that figure.

Ground shifting toward Sky
Looking ahead, Mr Fellet seems to have the momentum.

Sky TV recently secured all of TVNZ’s channels for its line-up, including the HD versions of TV1 and TV2 that had been glaringly absent before.

However, so far there has been no quid pro quo, with Sky TV still refusing to place Prime on Freeview. Mr Fellet says he will only do so when Freeview has enough audience, and advertising revenue, to cover the $2 million or so it would cost to place his free-to-air channel on Freeview each year.

Mr Fellet dismisses the idea that TiVo - which will take its broadcast TV feed from Freeview HD - will provide a boost for TVNZ when it launches a local version of the service ahead of Christmas.

TiVo (the new home of Mr Browning) has failed to gain any traction in Australia, Mr Fellet says.

Ahead of Christmas, the first hard drive recorder supporting the MyFreeview electronic programming guide was release.

But if TVNZ's TiVo launch goes according to plan (a grumpy MediaWorks allowing), a TiVo is expected to become the default platform for recording Freeview.