Case Study: NBC Sports Group achieves record-breaking Olympic streaming scale with Microsoft Azure

NBC Olympics breaks streaming records with support from Microsoft Azure

NBC Sports Group, the sports-media division of NBCUniversal responsible for televising and streaming major events, faced an unprecedented engineering challenge for the Rio 2016 Olympics: deliver 4,500+ hours of live coverage to millions of viewers across a vast and growing range of devices and time zones. The event became the largest digital sporting event to date, with unpredictable peaks (40% viewing on connected TVs), intensive multi-device requirements, and the need for 24/7 reliability at massive scale.

Working with Microsoft Azure, NBC deployed Azure Media Services, CDN, VMs, storage and network redundancy, doubling compute capacity and using dynamic packaging, cloud DVR, automated failover and real‑time dashboards to scale on demand. The result was flawless 17-day coverage with zero downtime, record engagement—3.3 billion total streaming minutes (2.71 billion live), 100 million unique users, 1080p streams and many more simultaneous HD channels than prior Games.

NBC Sports Group

Eric Black

Chief Technology Officer, Digital Media