\With on-demand TV viewing becoming an unmistakable nationwide trend in previous years, most consumers making the transition from traditional cable to online streaming services are satisfied with the results.

Those individuals, referred to as “cord-cutters,” have opted to not pay for a traditional multi-channel television subscription but rather favor some combination of broadband Internet and IPTV, digital video recorders, digital terrestrial television broadcasts or free-to-air satellite television. Additionally, rival media available over the Internet — such as Amazon Video, Hulu, iTunes, Netflix, Sling TV, and YouTube — have seen a huge uptick in traffic over the past decade, which has stymied the once-standard “corded” TV market.

In the local market, several families have followed suit. The general consensus seems to be that the decision to cut cable is largely fueled by a desire to save money and as a matter of convenience.

“I’m a cord-cutter from about two years back, and it’s one of the best decisions I ever made,” said Jason Tonon, of Lakewood. “It was mostly a money saver. We switched to save $50 a month and now use Netflix and Hulu, which is perfect for our schedules. Any shows I can’t access have been replaced by plenty of content I like, for much cheaper, and on demand. I like entertainment and Netflix and Hulu give it to me on my schedule, and it’s much cheaper so it’s a win-win. I’d recommend it for anyone.”

Paul Clemente, also of Lakewood, said he opted out of cable in 2013 and became a Netflix user in order to view original content exclusive to that service.

“I used a free trial of Netflix to watch the exclusive fourth season of ‘Arrested Development,'” he said. “I found that Netflix had enough shows to entertain me regularly. I thought I would be out of the loop with popular culture and hockey games but it was an easy adaptation.”

“My bill with my cable company was well over $100 a month with the package they gave me,” he added. “I cut my house phone and cable and maintained Netflix and NHL.tv, saving $1,500 per year. Currently, I have Netflix, Hulu and Amazon Video and still see a massive savings without sacrificing much.”

Renee Domenico and Michael Unger, of Gerry, said cable wasn’t meeting their needs in terms of scheduling and overall content.

“The value wasn’t there for our lifestyle,” Domenico said. “By the time we would get done working, have dinner with the kids and wrap up school activities we had limited choices on what we could watch on TV.”

We felt TV should be scheduled around our lives, not our lives around TV.”

“We started out with just Netflix and then added the Amazon Prime to our watching list,” she added. “We did use Hulu for a little while, when there was a new show out we thought we wanted to watch. We really like those three services for different reasons. The Netflix originals are really good, as are the (Amazon) Prime originals. And as far as, Hulu we can watch almost any current TV show. But I think the best part is we don’t constantly have the TV on just as background noise. We do more things together as a family now and l like that the kids have a limited TV intake, as do we. Also it’s easier to monitor with the kids are watching.”

Domenico said the only drawback to the experience is that the family isn’t as up-to-date on news and current events as it was. However, she said that has been mitigated by seeking out online news sources and other publications to make up the difference.

According to estimates by Parks Associates in 2009, about 900,000 Americans relied entirely on the Internet for television viewing. By 2010, quarterly customer describer declines were experienced by pay TV. A Nielsen report showed that during the fourth quarter of 2011, the number of people paying for television had dropped by 15 million people — a rate of 1.5 percent — and the number of cable subscribers dropped by 2.9 million.

In September, Variety Magazine estimating that 22 million American households will have cut the cord on cable, satellite or telco TV service to date by the end of 2017 — a 33 percent increase from 16.7 million in 2016. By 2021, the number of cord-cutters is expected to nearly equal the number of people who have never had pay TV — a total of 81 million U.S. adults. That means around 30 percent of American adults won’t have traditional pay TV at that point, per eMarketer’s revised forecast.