TV Ratings: Hallmark Holiday Movies More Popular Than Ever

Hallmark Channel ratings are up 2% over 2019′s holiday season, the Nielsen company said. That may not seem like much, but year-to-year increases are the exception rather than the rule in modern television.

The network turned its programming over to holiday fare on Oct. 23 and has been the top-rated entertainment cable channel, excluding news and sports, for the fourth quarter, Nielsen said.

“What we have seen is just how much our movies mean to our viewers,” Michelle Vicary, programming chief told The Associated Press.

“We made a choice not to let COVID affect us thematically,” she said. “There are a lot of places you can find information about COVID. What we provided was a respite from that.”

This season’s most popular movie has been “If I Only Had Christmas,” about a perky publicist who teams with a cynical executive to help a charity. It stars Candace Cameron Bure, probably the most reliable draw among a collection of actors who often return to Hallmark each holiday season.

CBS was the top-rated broadcast network last week, averaging 4.4 million viewers in prime time. NBC had 3.8 million, Fox had 2.9 million, ABC had 2.7 million, Univision had 870,000, Ion Television had 830,000 and Telemundo had 620,000.

The L-A Times reports CBS had been in third place behind Fox and NBC through Friday but moved into the top spot with its coverage of Alabama’s 52-46 victory over Florida in Saturday’s SEC Championship, which averaged 8.921 million viewers, seventh for the week behind three NFL games; “60 Minutes”; NBC’s nine-minute “Sunday Night Football” pre-kickoff show; and Fox’s six-minute NFL postgame show.

➤Top 20 Prime-Time TVs Shows (Total viewers):

1. NFL Football: Cleveland at N.Y. Giants, NBC, 15.61 million.

2. NFL Football: L.A. Chargers at Las Vegas, Fox, 12.96 million.

3. NFL Football: Baltimore at Cleveland, ESPN, 12.42 million.

4. “60 Minutes,” CBS, 11.59 million.

5. “NFL Pregame,” NBC, 11.31 million.

6. “NFL Postgame,” Fox, 10.96 million.

7. College Football: Alabama vs. Florida, CBS, 8.92 million.

8. “The Masked Singer,” Fox, 7.41 million.

9. “NFL Pregame,” Fox, 7.34 million.

10. “The Voice” (Tuesday, 9 p.m.), NBC, 7.27 million.

11. “The Voice” (Monday), NBC, 7.09 million.

12. “Football Night in America,” NBC, 6.92 million.

13. “Young Sheldon,” CBS, 6.86 million.

14. “Blue Bloods,” CBS, 6.38 million.

15. “Monday Night Kickoff,” ESPN, 6 million.

16. “The Voice” (Tuesday, 8 p.m.), NBC, 5.89 million.

17. “Garth & Trisha Live!” CBS, 5.82 million.

18. “Grey’s Anatomy,” ABC, 5.66 million.

19. “Station 19,” ABC, 5.63 million.

20. “Magnum, P.I.,” CBS, 5.48 million.

ABC’s “World News Tonight” won the evening news ratings race, averaging 9.7 million viewers. NBC’s “Nightly News” had 7.9 million and the “CBS Evening News” had 5.9 million.

Fox News Channel was the most popular cable network, watched by an average of 2.38 million people in prime time. ESPN had 2.07 million, MSNBC had 2 million, Hallmark had 1.72 million and CNN had 1.68 million. The only non-news or sports programs among cable’s 40 most popular last week were two Hallmark movies.

Week of Dec. 14 basic cable (Total Viewers)

According to TV Newser, Tucker Carlson Tonight averaged 3.4 million total viewers last week, down from the previous week, but still more viewers than any other cable news show.

Anderson Cooper 360 was the top prime time cable news show of the week among adults 25-54, averaging 506,000 demo viewers; a hair more than The Rachel Maddow Show (505,600), whose total also includes Friday, when Maddow was off.