Britons waste a week a year channel surfing: survey

LONDON (Reuters) - Britons overwhelmed by a plethora of digital television channels waste up to a week per year flicking through channels to find something to watch, according to a survey published on Friday.

Digital TV viewers in the UK spend between two and three hours a day on average watching TV but typically up to a quarter of that time is spent channel surfing, said the survey commissioned by Microsoft's Connected TV division.

"Despite this time investment, three quarters of digital viewers (73 percent) say they still miss programs they would have liked to watch because they find it difficult or time consuming to find out what's on," Microsoft said.

Despite having more than 100 channels to choose from, 41 percent stick to a handful of familiar channels, and one in three watch only the five main terrestrial channels, Microsoft said after the survey of nearly 2,000 digital TV viewers in the UK.

Microsoft commissioned the survey in connection with its Mediaroom software platform for Internet TV, which features a keyword search to help viewers find what they are looking for.

(Reporting by Georgina Prodhan, editing by Will Waterman)