TV Ratings: GOT Got The Numbers

HBO’s “Game of Thrones” has once again ridden a high body count to a record viewer count.

Sunday’s big-battle episode, the third of the final season, drew 17.8 million viewers either live on the network at 9 p.m., streamed, on-demand or in a rerun that aired later that night, according to The Associated Press citing Nielsen daata.

That made it the week’s most-watched show cable or broadcast and the most-watched one-day event ever in HBO’s four decades of existence, topping the “Game of Thrones” season eight premiere, which had 17.4 million viewers two weeks earlier.

The May 19 series finale is expected to break both records.

The numbers for Sunday’s episode are likely to grow considerably after delayed and repeat viewings. HBO said 38 million people have now watched the season eight premiere.

CBS shows dominated the rest of the week’s top 10, with “The Big Bang Theory” second, “Young Sheldon” third and “60 Minutes” fourth. That helped it win the week overall in prime time, averaging 4.4 million viewers. NBC had 3.4 million viewers, ABC had 3 million, Fox had 2 million, ION Television had 1.1 million, Telemundo had 1 million, Univision had 880,000, and the CW had 680,000.

Fox News Channel was the week’s most popular cable network, averaging 2.27 million viewers in prime time. TNT had 2 million, ESPN had 1.6 million, MSNBC had 1.58 million and HGTV had 1.2 million.

FNC is finishing the month of April as the most-watched network among total viewers in both total day and prime time, per Nielsen. The network has been the most-watched across the 6 a.m. – 6 a.m. daypart for 34 consecutive months now (1.4 million total viewers), and No. 1 in total prime time audience for three consecutive months (2.4 million total viewers).

For the 208th month in a row, Fox News also beat CNN and MSNBC in total viewers across both dayparts. FNC didn’t lose a whole lot of traction relative to its April 2018 total audience delivery. Compared to the same month last year, Fox News was flat in total prime time viewers and only -3% in total day viewers.

But the story was different when it came to drawing viewers from the key A25-54 viewers. Yes, Fox News remained No. 1 in cable news in that category, but the network was -19% vs. April 2018 in prime time, and -16%  in total day.

On broadcast TV, ABC’s “World News Tonight” topped the evening newscasts with an average of 8.5 million viewers. NBC’s “Nightly News” was second with 7.7 million and the “CBS Evening News” had 5.6 million viewers.

⏩ The Top 20 Primetime viewership numbers compiled by Nielsen for April 8-14:

1. “Game of Thrones,” HBO, 12.02 million.
2. “The Big Bang Theory,” CBS, 11.85 million.
3. “Young Sheldon,” CBS, 10.49 million.
4. “60 Minutes,” CBS, 9.27 million.
5. “American Idol,” ABC, 8.74 million.
6. “Chicago Fire,” NBC, 8.11 million.
7. “Chicago Med,” NBC, 7.89 million.
8. “Mom,” CBS, 7.85 million.
9. “Blue Bloods,” CBS, 7.78 million.
10. “The Voice,” NBC, 7.6 million.

11. “Survivor,” CBS, 7.51 million.
12. “NCIS,” CBS, 7.45 million.
13. “Chicago P.D.,” NBC, 6.99 million.
14. “Hawaii Five-0,” CBS, 6.62 million.
15. “NCIS,” (Tuesday, 9 p.m.), 6.52 CBS, million.
16. “NCIS: New Orleans,” CBS, 6.47 million.
17. “The Voice” (Tuesday), NBC, 6.32 million.
18. “The Neighborhood,” CBS, 6.28 million.
19. “911,” Fox, 6 million.
20. “NCIS: Los Angeles,” CBS, 5.66 million.

⏩ From syndication land, Jeopardy ratings rose to a six-week high and topped all syndicated shows in the session ending April 21, the final frame before the May sweep as contestant James Holzhauer took home a $131,137 payday on April 17 and shattered the program’s single-day winnings record, a mark also held by Holzhauer.

According to TVNewsCheck, Jeopardy jumped 5% to a 6.7 live-plus-same-day national Nielsen rating beating frequent quiz show topper Family Feud’s 6.1.

Syndication powerhouse Judge Judy, which had ruled the household ratings for a modern record 40 straight weeks, aired five days of reruns and dipped 3% to a close second-place 6.5.

Judy was also one of several strips preempted in a number of markets due to the coverage of the Notre Dame fire on April 15 and the Mueller Report’s public release on April 18.

In other action, Dr. Phil eased 4% to a 2.7, but still finished first in the talk show category for the 137th consecutive week.

Live with Kelly and Ryan was the only talker in the big three ahead of last year, improving 5% annually. In addition, Live continued to roll with a 5% rally to a 2.3, outperforming Ellen DeGeneres for the eighth week in a row. Ellen was unchanged at a 1.9.

⏩ The week’s top-rated daytime talk shows in the women 25-54 demo were:

1. Dr. Phil (1.1, -8% from the week before)
2. Live with Kelly and Ryan (1.0, unchanged)
3. Ellen DeGeneres (0.8, -11%), tied with Wendy Williams (0.8, +14%)
4. Maury (0.7, unchanged)
5. Steve Wilkos (0.6, unchanged)
6. Steve (0.5, unchanged)