Although online catch-up TV has seen a quick take-up since their introduction by terrestrial broadcasters, the service still has a long way to go.

That is the view held by David Allen of Tech Watch, who was speaking in response to figures from Broadband Choices which show that 72 per cent of those quizzed in a survey had not recently taken advantage of offerings such as the BBC's iPlayer.

With this in mind, Mr Allen says he sees the service as still lagging behind other forms of recording technology.

"Despite all of this content being available for virtually nothing, these types of services still have a long way to go before they catch up with the use of recording equipment such as VHS, PVRs and DVDs," Mr Allen highlighted.

Presenting the research, Broadband Choices product director Michael Phillips picked out download limits as a potential problem for those wishing to watch a large amount of catch-up content online.