For watching online video, tablets are (finally) catching up to PCs

If you own a tablet, there’s a strong chance you’ve watch videos on it. We’re talkin’ YouTube, Hulu, a full-on downloaded movie.

And soon, your tablet might replace your laptop altogether as the go-to, non-TV device for watching digital video — if it hasn’t already.

According to eMarketer, 113.4 million Americans will regularly watch videos on tablets this year. That’s more than three quarters of all tablet users in the United States.

For comparison, 89 million people are expected to regularly watch digital video content on their phones in 2014.

“Based on current trends, it’s an inevitability that in the near future, tablets will overtake time spent with video online — on desktops and laptops — as the leading digital medium for watching video programming,” reads a statement from the analyst group.

With the popularity of iPad devices and the never-ending stream of new Android and Windows tablets popping up in stores and online, the tablet market is coming into its own. In fact, eMarketer says, almost half the U.S. population will use a tablet at least once a month this year.

And of course, more eyeballs watching video on tablets means more ad dollars spent on tablet-based video. But oddly, the ad dollars still skew in favor of traditional online (read: desktop and laptop) channels.

“Of the $12.27 billion we expect to be spent on digital video in 2018, 55.7 percent will go toward online, despite the fact that time spent with mobile video is already 50 percent larger than time spent watching video online and is likely to continue increasing that gap,” eMarketer’s report continues.