The use of commercial video streaming services has surged ahead in Great Britain, according to official figures.

Close to half of all adults said they had watched Netflix, Now TV, Amazon Prime Video or a similar internet-based service over the past three months.

That compares to less than a third of respondents in 2016, the last time the figure was given.

The data is contained in the Office for National Statistics' annual Internet Access and Use report.

The study also indicates that the percentage of households with some kind of internet access has not changed since last year, remaining at 90%.

But it does suggest that usage has increased, with 86% of over-16s reporting that they use the net daily or almost every day. The prior year, the figure was 80%.

Sending and receiving emails remains the most popular task, with 84% of adults saying they had done this over the past quarter.

But the activities that saw the biggest gains over the past two years were:

watching video-on-demand from commercial services - 46% had done so over the last three months, up from 29% in 2016

watching videos from YouTube and similar platforms - 62%, up from 47%

listening to net-streamed music - 58%, up from 49%

internet banking - 69%, up from 60%

selling goods or services over the internet - 25%, up from 18%

One media industry analyst said the growing popularity of online TV had meant providers were having to adapt their offerings.

"If you look at the breakdown of who is using these services, it's starting to bleed outside the younger tech-savvy audiences and getting traction among older groups as well," commented Tom Harrington from Enders Analysis.

"You can see that reflected in the types of programming being made available, with Netflix and others commissioning original shows pitched at more mature audiences."