Updated with 2008 Results
The decline in tennis’ The Championships, Wimbledon US TV ratings has been quite substantial, much more so than most other sports championship events (you can find many such charts in our Reference category). Recent upward ticks seem to occur (with only a few exceptions) when the Men’s champion is from the US, and then the long term downward trend takes hold again. Discounting comparisons to the ratings prior to 1987 (because of a Nielsen measurement quirk described below) viewership has fallen almost in half the last 20 years. Is this due to the lack of a US Men’s champion since 2000? On the other hand, US Women have done quite well since 1999, but don’t seem to have helped the ratings. I admit to not having any clever guesses as to why the decline has been so severe. Anyone else have any better guesses?
7/14 Update: Chart and table updated with 2008 results. The All Williams Women’s final, plus the epic Federer v. Nadal battle did produce a noticeable uptick in the Wimbledon ratings, but only to levels last seen in 2002.
Complete Wimbledon Tennis TV Ratings, 1973-2008:
| Year | Viewers (million) | HH Rating | Share | Telecasts | Network | Winners (Women/Men) |
| 1973 | 4.60 | 4.5 | 19 | 2 | NBC | KING/KODES |
| 1974 | 6.62 | 5.6 | 23 | 2 | NBC | EVERT/CONNORS |
| 1975* | 6.89 | 5.4 | 23 | 4 | NBC | KING/ASHE |
| 1976* | 6.04 | 5.1 | 20 | 4 | NBC | EVERT/BORG |
| 1977* | 6.37 | 5.6 | 25 | 3 | NBC | WADE/BORG |
| 1978* | 7.81 | 5.8 | 23 | 3 | NBC | NAVRATILOVA/BORG |
| 1979* | 6.51 | 5.1 | 22 | 3 | NBC | NAVRATILOVA/BORG |
| 1980* | 8.42 | 6.6 | 26 | 4 | NBC | GOOLAGONG/BORG |
| 1981* | 7.98 | 6.0 | 25 | 5 | NBC | EVERT-LLOYD/MCENROE |
| 1982* | 7.79 | 5.1 | 20 | 6 | NBC | NAVRATILOVA/CONNORS |
| 1983* | 4.78 | 4.1 | 17 | 6 | NBC | NAVRATILOVA/MCENROE |
| 1984* | 4.56 | 3.9 | 14 | 7 | NBC | NAVRATILOVA/MCENROE |
| 1985* | 5.69 | 4.5 | 17 | 8 | NBC | NAVRATILOVA/BECKER |
| 1986* | 5.22 | 3.9 | 14 | 7 | NBC | NAVRATILOVA/BECKER |
| 1987 | 3.95 | 3.6 | 14 | 7 | NBC | NAVRATILOVA/CASH |
| 1988 | 4.29 | 3.6 | 14 | 9 | NBC | GRAF/EDBERG |
| 1989 | 4.56 | 3.9 | 15 | 9 | NBC | GRAF/BECKER |
| 1990 | 3.74 | 3.1 | 12 | 9 | NBC | NAVRATILOVA/EDBERG |
| 1991 | 4.65 | 3.7 | 13 | 15 | NBC | GRAF/STICH |
| 1992 | 4.48 | 3.7 | 13 | 15 | NBC | GRAF/AGASSI |
| 1993 | 3.74 | 3.1 | 11 | 14 | NBC | GRAF/SAMPRAS |
| 1994 | 3.16 | 2.7 | 10 | 14 | NBC | MARTINEZ/SAMPRAS |
| 1995 | 3.54 | 3.0 | 11 | 10 | NBC | GRAF/SAMPRAS |
| 1996 | 2.91 | 2.5 | 9 | 9 | NBC | GRAF/KRAJICEK |
| 1997 | 2.70 | 2.3 | 9 | 9 | NBC | HINGIS/SAMPRAS |
| 1998 | 2.64 | 2.2 | 8 | 9 | NBC | NOVOTNA/SAMPRAS |
| 1999 | 3.38 | 2.9 | 10 | 9 | NBC | DAVENPORT/SAMPRAS |
| 2000 | 4.07 | 3.2 | 11 | 9 | NBC | WILLIAMS/SAMPRAS |
| 2001 | 3.20 | 2.6 | 9 | 9 | NBC | V. WILLIAMS/IVANISEVIC |
| 2002 | 2.71 | 2.1 | 7 | 9 | NBC | S. WILLIAMS/HEWITT |
| 2003 | 2.49 | 2.0 | 7 | 9 | NBC | S. WILLIAMS/FEDERER |
| 2004 | 2.54 | 1.9 | 6 | 9 | NBC | SHARAPOVA/FEDERER |
| 2005 | 2.49 | 1.9 | 6 | 9 | NBC | V. WILLIAMS/FEDERER |
| 2006 | 2.06 | 1.6 | 5 | 9 | NBC | MAURESMO/FEDERER |
| 2007 | 2.29 | 1.7 | 5 | 9 | NBC | V. WILLIAMS/FEDERER |
| 2008 | 2.64 | 1.9 | 6 | 9 | NBC | V. WILLIAMS/NADAL |
*Note: Data does not include the telecasts in June because data was not produced in the last complete week of June prior to 1987.
Data shown is an average of all telecasts including finals and semi-finals. Data for 2006-8 are Live+SD, prior years are Live viewing.
Nielsen TV Ratings Data: ©2008 Nielsen Media Research, Inc. All Rights Reserved.
Watching tennis about as exciting as watching grass grow. Its boring, its dull, thats why so few people watch it. Now if they used a robotic tennis ball cannon to randomly shoot balls at the players heads, that might spice things up enough for higher ratings. It would just randomly select one of the players to shoot at. The only thing worse to watch on TV is golf. Talk about a snoozer (Watch guy stare at ball for 10 minutes, stand up, move around, stare at ball for another 5 minutes, stand there for 2 more minutes and slowly putt the ball towards the hole – and MISS ! Only Tiger Woods is remotely watchable. Playing golf is ok, but watching other people on TV? Painfull !
Obviously you didn't watch the Wimbledon men's final this year, which was the most exciting sporting event I've seen all year.
Also, it's difficult to compare the average ratings of numerous telecasts (including early rounds) in recent years with earlier years which average only the final rounds of coverage.
BTW, “NBC's coverage of the Wimbledon gentlemen's final earned it's best rating in eight years, peaking at a 6.5/15 from 4:00-4:30pm ET, and marking the best overnight for a Wimbledon gentlemen's final involving two non-U.S. players since '91 (Becker-Stich, 5.0/17).”
Jamie, you are correct on trying to make apples to apples comparisons between the various years with the numbers above, but the telecast data from 1996-2007 is equivalent in the number of rounds/telecasts so is directly comparable.
And while the 1987-1995 data above includes more telecasts of earlier rounds, that should *reduce* those averages, making the decline since then even more substantial. And I indicated above that comparisons prior to 1987 shouldn't be made.
And you are correct, the initial ratings data for this years men's and women's finals indicates it was a big ratings uptick. I am interested to see the final numbers.
how do you account for the time slot? And what happened in 1983?
The numbers are the average viewership across all telecasts for that year.
I don't have any information why the average viewership would have fallen so sharply in 1983.
Bill,
I know this has nothing to do with the root question so I apologize up front but I produced a documentary film about 1 year on the pro tennis tour following 2 former top 100 players as they’re about to lose their rankings and retire. it sold in 10 countreis. I’m producing another and want to study the entire tennis television market from a world perspective. I want to know ratings, where tennis is most popular, who’s airing the most content, are there any current tennis shows in production, etc. Do you or anyone else reading this entry know how best to attack such a task?
Geoff, I sadly have no more information on tennis TV viewership than you see in this post, and honestly don’t know where, other than Googling, to find it.