TV Ratings: CBS’ ‘60 Minutes’ Returns With A Bang

CBS' Scott Pelley and President Biden

The 55th season premiere of “60 Minutes” was the week’s top-rated non-sports prime-time program last week, while the season’s final performance episode of “America’s Got Talent” was first among entertainment programs, according to The L-A Times.

“60 Minutes” featured its first interview with President Joe Biden since he took office and Lesley Stahl’s interview with Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi. The episode averaged 10.197 million viewers, fifth among prime-time programs airing between Sept. 12 and Sunday, behind two NFL games and two NFL pregame shows, according to live-plus-same-day figures released by Nielsen Tuesday.

“60 Minutes” followed a 61-minute runover of CBS’ afternoon NFL coverage in the Eastern and Central time zones, where the bulk of the nation’s population lives. The runover into prime time, mainly of the Dallas Cowboys’ 20-17 victory over the Cincinnati Bengals on Brett Maher’s 50-yard field goal as time expired, averaged 29.11 million viewers. Viewership for “60 Minutes” was up 21.3% from the 9.984 million average for the 54th season premiere.

Viewership for nearly all forms of programming has decreased because of increased programming on streaming, online, digital and cable platforms.

For the second time in the 2-week-old NFL season, NBC’s “Sunday Night Football” was at the top of the prime-time ratings, with the Green Bay Packers’ 27-10 victory over the Chicago Bears averaging 19.545 million viewers, 16.1% less than the 23.296 million average for the Tampa Bay Buccaneers’ 19-3 victory over Dallas on the “Sunday Night Football” opener a week earlier.

The total audience for Sunday’s game, which includes streaming viewership on Peacock, NBC Sports and NFL digital platforms, was 20.8 million viewers, 16.8% less than the 25 million total audience for the “Sunday Night Football” season opener, according to figures provided by NBC.

The ABC-ESPN “Monday Night Football” simulcast of the Seattle Seahawks’ 17-16 victory over the Denver Broncos Sept. 12 finished second, averaging 18.294 million viewers. That includes its average of 7.998 million viewers on ESPN, the most among the week’s cable programs.

The combination of “Sunday Night Football” and four hours and one minute of “America’s Got Talent” made NBC the top-ranked network for the second consecutive week, averaging 6 million viewers. CBS was second, averaging 4.24 million, followed by ABC, which averaged 3.56 million.

Fox averaged 1.79 million viewers for its prime-time programming, topped by Saturday’s broadcast of Ohio State’s 77-21 victory over Toledo that averaged 3.048 million viewers, 31st for the week.

The combination of “Monday Night Football” and two nights of college football gave ESPN the top spot in the cable network race for the third consecutive week, averaging 2.245 million viewers. Fox News Channel averaged 2.176 million viewers to finish second for the third consecutive week following 12 consecutive first-place finishes.

MSNBC averaged 1.218 million viewers for its third consecutive third-place finish after seven consecutive second-place finishes.