Francis Kong used to spend $50 a month for a cable TV subscription. Then, tired of paying for something he used sporadically, he quit.

These days, the Alameda resident spends about $8 for a monthly Netflix subscription, which allows him to get TV shows like “Daredevil.” He also watches “Supergirl” for free on the CW network’s site. For culinary inspiration, instead of the Food Network, he takes his smartphone into the kitchen and streams cooking videos on YouTube.

“Everything I ever wanted on cable I can get now, and (it’s) more convenient and cheaper,” said Kong, 47, who made the switch two years ago. He has mostly ignored attempts by cable companies to woo him back.

Once seen as a household essential, traditional pay-TV subscriptions peaked at 90 percent of U.S. households in 2010, according to Deloitte, a company whose services include analytics and consulting. Now, pay-TV services are increasingly becoming something Americans can live without, as Silicon Valley companies push further into digital streaming.

In 2015, 24.6 million households in the U.S. did not have subscriptions through cable, satellite or telephone companies, up 9 percent from the year before, according to the Convergence Research Group, a Canadian consulting firm. By the end of 2016, the firm estimates that figure will grow to 26.7 million, representing roughly 22 percent of U.S. households.

“As the younger generation grows older, they are never going to pay for a cable subscription,” said Eunice Shin, managing director for consulting firm Manatt Digital. “The future growth for traditional cable is pretty dire.”

Live-streaming options aren’t as comprehensive as typical cable packages. That’s a key gripe, in addition to the connection occasionally cutting out. And no company has yet offered a way to allow customers to pick and choose channels, subscribing only to those they want.

Cable companies are trying to fight back, by offering cheaper packages to customers and their own digital streaming options that allow people to watch content across multiple devices. Last month, AT&T launched DirecTV Now, a $35-a-month streaming service that allows customers to see channels such as MTV and Lifetime on their TVs, smartphones and tablets.

Driven in part by the Bay Area’s technology giants, opportunities to watch entertainment streamed over the Internet have exploded. This year, Manatt Digital counted 71 subscription or ad-supported streaming services in the U.S., including Netflix and CBS All Access, up from 18 six years ago. Eleven services show live streams, up from three in 2010, the firm said; these include Twitter’s Periscope, Amazon’s Twitch and Facebook Live.

Video streaming has long been dominated by Netflix and Amazon, which pay for original shows like “House of Cards” or “Transparent” that appear exclusively on their services in the U.S. In recent years, newer players including Facebook, Twitter and Yahoo have begun live-streaming sports events — a critical part of why so many consumers remain tied to cable.

Yahoo hosted the first live-streamed NFL game in 2015 and later landed deals for hockey and baseball games. This year, Twitter paid $10 million for the rights to air Thursday night NFL games. And as Facebook ramps up its presence in video, adding a tab on its mobile app to feature the latest clips and live streams, some schools like Mercer University in Georgia are airing games live on the social network.

Facebook said Wednesday it is also exploring funding original content, including sports, which would be added to a tab on its mobile app that’s devoted to video.

“Our goal is to show people what is possible on the platform and learn as we continue to work with video partners around the world,” Ricky Van Veen, Facebook’s head of global creative strategy, said in a statement. A company spokeswoman said it’s in the “really early days” in its process and declined to share details on the arrangements with video partners.

Analysts say Silicon Valley’s largest tech companies are eager to go after people who don’t subscribe to traditional TV. Bigger audiences mean more advertising dollars.

LeEco, a Chinese electronics company, announced streaming offerings across its smart TVs and smartphones this fall. Jeff Briller, North American content general manager for LeEco, said its services were designed so viewers could easily shift from watching on a phone to a TV, and would eventually include virtual reality and playback on cars.

Cable and telecom companies are pushing back. Besides AT&T’s launch of DirecTV Now, Comcast last month said it would offer certain customers access to Dish’s Sling TV. While some of Sling’s offerings, like ESPN, overlap with what Comcast already offers, an upgrade that starts at $10 adds programming in Arabic, Chinese, Spanish and Urdu to what customers can currently get.

Companies like Comcast are also trying to rope customers back by tying their cable packages together with other desirable services like high-speed Internet.

That’s what got Francis Kong back into becoming a cable subscriber. He upgraded his Comcast services to a $97-a-month package, which gives him more Internet bandwidth, and as a bonus it includes an Xfinity TV subscription. Entrenched as a cord-cutter, however, he mostly opts for shorter videos on YouTube and rarely uses Xfinity TV.

“I have enough other options to watch,” Kong said.

While some tech companies have experimented with trying to create or license original shows and push for more video, they have had mixed results.

Yahoo paid for the rights to the canceled NBC sitcom “Community” and commissioned original shows for Yahoo Screen, only to write down millions in programming costs because Yahoo couldn’t make it work financially. YouTube launched a subscription service called YouTube Red that would give its users access to exclusive content by some of its popular creators, but the Verge recently reported that the number of subscribers remains small, with just 1.5 million paying in its first year. (YouTube declined to comment on Red’s subscribers.) And Facebook, one of the leaders in digital online advertising, had its own stumble this year, when it acknowledged that it had exaggerated video view counts on the social network.

But analysts say large tech companies in Silicon Valley could change the entertainment space.

“The two companies that everyone is afraid of in this video space are Facebook and Google,” Manatt Digital’s Shin said. The companies are well-positioned in a crucial area: how people find things to watch.

“Who controls what content is served up to you and suggested for you to watch and is easy for you to access is in a very powerful position,” Shin added. “It’s Facebook and Google who control that.”

The growth of video streaming does not just benefit consumers. Alex Noyer says it also helps independent producers like him. Noyer’s documentary “808,” which is about a drum machine, debuted on Apple Music last week. It was the first feature-length documentary to premiere on Apple’s streaming music service, which also offers video. Netflix, Amazon and others are ordering so many shows that Hollywood is running out of studio space and crews are increasingly hard to book.

“It was humbling and exciting to get our first outing as an independent movie with a very custom-made release plan for us,” Noyer said.

But there’s still room for growth.

Four years ago, Josh Jacobson climbed atop his San Francisco house, took down his satellite dish and, using a pair of wire cutters, literally cut the cord. Jacobson says he spends about three hours watching video on his TV and four hours on his smartphone per week, watching YouTube and other videos on his hour-long commute on a shuttle to work at Yahoo, where he’s a director of product management for Yahoo Mail.

He hasn’t gone back to satellite TV, opting to pay for Netflix, Hulu and HBO subscriptions. But occasionally, he’ll have to rely on friends with cable to watch live sports. Earlier this year, he drove to a friend’s house to watch a Golden State Warriors game.

“He didn’t say much,” Jacobson said. “We already have an understanding.”

Wendy Lee is a San Francisco Chronicle staff writer. Email: wlee@sfchronicle.com Twitter: @thewendylee