Idol Rules Again

Scoreboard for Tuesday, Jan 15, 2008
Total Viewers (million)	33.24	13.62	8.83	5.12	2.15
Rating/Share: Adults 18-49	13.8/32	2.6/6	3.5/8	1.4/3	1.0/2

As expected, FOX’s season premiere of American Idol led the night with NFL playoff style numbers. The two hour premiere averaged 33.24 million viewers and a healthy 13.8/32 in the 18-49 demographic in the overnights (as always, subject to change).

Worth noting is that for all the talk of “strike effect” benefit for Idol, it actually had 4 million less viewers than last year’s season premiere and slipped 13% in the 18-49. The strike doesn’t appear to to be driving viewers to the show, and on top of it AI seems to have reached its peak ratings and is now on the long slide downward.

Still, FOX wound up averaging more viewers than all the other networks combined. Hardest hit seems to be ABC which is bordering on CW style numbers, especially in the demo. A new Boston Legal at 10pm couldn’t find even 8 million viewers. The Biggest Loser was also a big loser, losing about 30% of its audience from the previous week. Over on CBS, a new episode of NCIS and part 2 of the Comanche Moon miniseries performed admirably given the competition.

NBC took second in the demo for the night, mostly on the strength of Law & Order: SVU at 10p, (when American Idol was already over). While outside of Friday Night Smackdown!, CW is hard pressed to generate ratings, given the Idol debut and the relative numbers for other shows on The CW, One Tree Hill had a good night.

Full night’s details:

Nielsen Ratings Source: Nielsen Media Research. Full night’s results available via Marc Berman/Mediaweek.