NEW YORK (AP) — Television’s biggest event keeps getting bigger.
This year’s Super Bowl between Seattle and Denver was the most-watched TV event in U.S. history, with an audience even larger than the Nielsen company originally thought. Nielsen said Tuesday that the game was seen by 112.2 million viewers, or 700,000 more than it had initially estimated the previous day.
Fox’s comedy “New Girl,” featuring a guest appearance by Prince, reached 26.3 million people in the coveted time slot after the game.
Television’s most popular drama last week was CBS’ “Blue Bloods,” seen by 12.93 million. Even though a handful of other shows, like “NCIS,” had repeat episodes, it’s an achievement for a Friday night series to draw such a strong audience. Over the past few years, the broadcast networks have deemphasized Fridays, which is second only to Saturdays for the least-viewed night of the week.
Fox’s “The Following” reached just over 6 million viewers for its second-season premiere, Nielsen said.
Thanks to Sunday night’s game, Fox averaged 30.1 million viewers in prime time. CBS had 7.8 million, NBC had 4.8 million, ABC had 4.6 million, Univision had 2.9 million, the CW has 1.7 million, Telemundo had 1.4 million and ION Television had 1.3 million.
Among cable networks, USA averaged 2.19 million viewers in prime time, Fox News Channel had 2.18 million, History had 2.05 million, ESPN had 1.98 million and The Disney Channel had 1.92 million.
NBC’s “Nightly News” topped the evening newscasts with an average of 10.5 million viewers. ABC’s “World News” was second with 9.4 million and the “CBS Evening News” had 8.4 million viewers.
For the week of Jan. 27-Feb. 2, the top 10 shows, their networks and viewerships: Super Bowl: Denver vs Seattle, Fox, 112.19 million; “Super Bowl Post-Game Show” (9:55 p.m.), Fox, 93.38 million; “Super Bowl Post-Game Show” (Sunday, 10:03 p.m.), Fox, 65.78 million; “New Girl” (Sunday, 10:23 p.m.), Fox, 26.3 million; “The Big Bang Theory,” CBS, 19.05 million; “Blue Bloods,” CBS, 12.93 million; “American Idol” (Wednesday), Fox, 12.73 million; “NCIS,” CBS, 11.74 million; “The Millers,” CBS, 11.5 million; “American Idol” (Thursday), Fox, 11.42 million.
___
ABC is owned by The Walt Disney Co. CBS is owned by CBS Corp. CW is a joint venture of Warner Bros. Entertainment and CBS Corp. Fox is owned by 21st Century Fox. NBC and Telemundo are owned by Comcast Corp. ION Television is owned by ION Media Networks.
___
Online:
https://www.nielsen.com
About Post Author
