Fairfax has almost three times as many video users in Australia as its publisher rival News according to Nielsen data for October.

In ranking of parents video streaming websites led by Google, Vevo, Microsoft and InterActive Corp, Fairfax Media takes fifth place with 1.82 million unique users compared to News 635,000. It streamed almost eight million videos in a market dominated by Google (1.43 billion) whose YouTube service was visited by 88 per cent of all Australians who viewed online video in the month.

Nielsen’s new VideoCensus Audience Measurement Ratings service – launched earlier this month – includes rankings of the most popular brands for Australians streaming videos, audience size and reach, stream volumes, time spent and visits per person.

Fairfax’s smh.com.au is placed second (behind ninemsn news websites) among news and informtion video sites, with stablemates theage.com.au fourth and brisbanetimes.com.au eighth. News (news.com.au) is placed seventh, behind ABC news websites. The smh.com.au unique audience (at 1.115 million uniques) is more than three times that of its nearest News rival.

Nielsen says YouTube dominated the entertainment category, in which more than 10.9 million Australians watched more than 1.4 billion streams. The category accounts for 92 per cent of the online video audience.

Some 47 per cent watched news and information videos in a list including Ninemsn news video, Fairfax’s SMH and The Age, as well as Yahoo!7, News Australia, the ABC and BBC.