| Scoreboard |  |
 |
 |
 |
 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Total Viewers (million) | 9.29 | 6.25 | 5.32 | 3.94 | 1.81 |
| Rating/Share: Adults 18-49 | 2.2/7 | 2.0/6 | 1.3/4 | 1.1/3 | 0.5/2 |
CBS easily won the night with a combination of Ghost Whisperer, a repeat of Numb3rs and a new episode of Numb3rs. Lipstick Jungle fared no better in the 9pm slot, and the return of Dateline went mostly unnoticed.
Full details:
| Time | Net | Show | Viewers (Millons) | 18-49 Rating/Share |
| 8:00 | CBS | Ghost Whisperer | 9.71 | 2.4/8 |
| ABC | How the Grinch Stole Christmas 8p-10p (R) | 6.17 | 2.1/7 | |
| FOX | Are You Smarter Than a 5th Grader | 5.45 | 1.4/4 | |
| NBC | Greatest Holiday Moments | 4.44 | 1.03 | |
| CW | Grandma Got Run Over…(R) | 1.89 | 0.6/2 | |
| 9:00 | CBS | Numb3rs (R) | 8.45 | 1.9/6 |
| FOX | Don’t Forget the Lyrics | 5.19 | 1.5/5 | |
| NBC | Lipstick Jungle | 3.58 | 1.1/3 | |
| CW | The Story of Santa Claus (R) | 1.73 | 0.5/2 | |
| 10:00 | CBS | Numb3rs | 9.72 | 2.4/7 |
| ABC | 20/20 | 6.42 | 1.8/6 | |
| NBC | Dateline | 3.80 | 1.1/3 |
Shows are sorted by viewers in each time slot.
Nielsen TV Ratings: ©2008 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved. Source Marc Berman/Mediaweek.
Definitions:
Fast Affiliate Ratings: These first national ratings, including demographics, are available at approximately 11 AM (ET) the day after telecast, and are released to subscribing customers daily. These data, from the National People Meter sample, are strictly time-period information, based on the normal broadcast network feed, and include all programming on the affiliated stations, sometimes including network programming, sometimes not. The figures may include stations that did not air the entire network feed, as well as local news breaks or cutaways for local coverage or other programming. Fast Affiliate ratings are not as useful for live programs and are likely to differ significantly from the final results, because the data reflect normal broadcast feed patterns. For example, with a World Series game, Fast Affiliate Ratings would include whatever aired from 8-11PM on affiliates in the Pacific Time Zone, following the live football game, but not game coverage that begins at 5PM PT. The same would be true of Presidential debates as well as live award shows and breaking news reports.
Rating: Estimated percentage of the universe of TV households (or other specified group) tuned to a program in the average minute. Ratings are expressed as a percent.
Share (of Audience): The percent of households (or persons) using television who are tuned to a specific program, station or network in a specific area at a specific time. (See also, Rating, which represents tuning or viewing as a percent of the entire population being measured.)
Time Shifted Viewing – Program ratings for national sources are produced in three streams of data – Live, Live+Same Day (Live+SD) and Live+7 Day. Time shifted figures account for incremental viewing that takes place with DVRs which are currently in approximately 24.4% of all U.S. TV households. Live+Same Day (Live+SD) include viewing during the same broadcast day as the original telecast, with a cut-off of 3:00AM local time when meters transmit daily viewing to Nielsen for processing. Live+7 Day ratings include incremental viewing that takes place during the 7 days following a telecast.
For more information see Numbers 101.
December 6th, 2008 at 11:35 am
GW dropped in the ratings a bit.
December 6th, 2008 at 11:38 am
W00t, Ghost Whisperer FTW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! It’s a MAN’S show! Unlike Football.
December 6th, 2008 at 12:26 pm
When can I find out how many viewers Merry Christmas, Drake & Josh got?
December 6th, 2008 at 12:37 pm
Running repeats last week really killed Ghost Whisperer’s momentum. Though I suppose some of the drop could be explained as longtime viewers finally tuning out now that the new status quo has been established.
December 6th, 2008 at 1:38 pm
LadiesMan, we get weekly cable show data on Tuesdays watch here:
http://tvbythenumbers.com/category/ratings/nielsen-top-cable-tv-show-ratings
December 6th, 2008 at 3:19 pm
Wow how many Christmas movies does ABC have in the storeroom?
December 6th, 2008 at 4:09 pm
Ben, ABC = Disney. I believe the answer to your question is “unlimited”.
December 6th, 2008 at 4:09 pm
Is it me or is it not worth noting that the CW numbers don’t entirely suck!
December 6th, 2008 at 4:15 pm
Tony, it’s you. While those aren’t the CW’s regular Friday shows, they are just about exactly their regular, dreadful Friday numbers.
December 6th, 2008 at 4:59 pm
NBC….. we make FOX look good!
December 6th, 2008 at 6:31 pm
I’m working on the idea that on any other night, the CW would take being within a quarter to a half of the 18-49 of the leader.
December 6th, 2008 at 8:01 pm
I MISS MOONLIGHT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
December 6th, 2008 at 8:57 pm
Well all is well still in the world, it’s a Friday Ratings post and we got our first poster referring to MOONLIGHT!
I was getting worried for a second there that they had given up.
December 6th, 2008 at 8:59 pm
Yeah, Vampgirl, I miss Moonlight, too. Friday nights will NEVER be the same (at least until next month when SciFi runs the series again
December 6th, 2008 at 9:59 pm
Nick C cracks me up
December 7th, 2008 at 12:43 am
ok wtf, zappy and greg r u adevertising??????
December 7th, 2008 at 12:47 am
I like the ratings tables on this website and the cancel-renewal index.
December 7th, 2008 at 12:51 am
NBC, really sucks on Fridays now, actually they suck all together. that’s what they get for canceling Las Vegas. That show was the only one that stood a chance against Numb3rs. It was also one of the stronger shows on Friday night. Because of the fact that Las Vegas barely got any promotions from NBC, the ratings for the show were nothing but exceptional. Right?
December 7th, 2008 at 1:06 am
I “Zapp’d” Zappy & Gregg’s comments. While we love the Zap2it site a.) their reports are not up HOURS before ours, (quite often, by several minutes though) b.) I seriously doubt whoever that was is really from Zap2it and c.) yeah, pretty tables
December 7th, 2008 at 1:25 am
zap2it’s reports suk and i wonder how dollhouse does on fridays and id laugh if tscc got better ratings on friday
December 7th, 2008 at 2:12 am
CW’s 18-49 average looks a little off.
I wonder why CBS didn’t air a Mentalist or NCIS repeat this week. They would’ve done better than the Numb3rs one (even though they still won the night).
December 7th, 2008 at 2:32 am
Jon, I think that CBS have worked this night out now. Notice how when the Mentalist of NCIS played repeats, GW and Numbers ratings were pretty much level. Well even with a Numbers repeat they stayed level.
While we can possibly all agree on lead-in, lead-out probably is a lot looser, and I think last night there was maybe only 9.9 million viewers there, and they knew it.
Also, another thing is, how better to get people watching Numbers than putting it in a slot that they have seen work, this week. If the audience can stand on it’s own, then its a stronger show than one that needs its lead in.
December 7th, 2008 at 2:33 am
Jon/Tony — the overall 18-49 average for the CW was correct, but the 18-49 info for the Story of Santa Claus was wrong. It has been corrected.
December 7th, 2008 at 6:37 am
Tony – I don’t exactly understand what you’re saying. Do you mean that CBS is experimenting with how many viewers Numb3rs can get at 9 PM?
Personally, I think CBS should keep GW and Numb3rs the way they are, but try premiering a new show at 9 in between them. Those two shows have already shown their relative stability, and the 9 PM slot in between those two shows would be perfect to launch a new show. Of course, if that doesn’t work, they can just go back to repeats.
Having two Numb3rs in a row seems kind of odd to me. Though I don’t watch that show myself, I wouldn’t want to sit through two back-to-back episodes of, say, CSI when one of them is just a repeat.
December 7th, 2008 at 10:53 am
What I was saying Jon was that CBS knows that whatever is put into the middle, as long as it is strong programming, is going to keep their audience there all night, and so by putting that middle programme as a strong episode of Numb3rs, they have a chance of hooking viewers to the show, so that when they premiere Plashpoint there in 2009, Numb3rs is stronger in itself; incase Flashpoint does what other shows have done previously and lose viewers.
December 7th, 2008 at 12:15 pm
Jon, TonyS, Flashpoint goes on CBS Friday at 9pm starting Jan 9.
December 7th, 2008 at 2:31 pm
I know, hence my statement.
December 8th, 2008 at 10:16 am
Hmmm…I hope SARAH CONNOR does well Friday nights…G.W. is the only competition but it’s also Friday nights…I see SARAH CONNOR doing about the same as the game shows FOX runs…I think they want people that watch GW to jump to DOLLHOUSE and while Terminator fans stay on – DOLLHOUSE will establish 5 million people to start…at the same time nearly 10 million people watch GW live – so ther is still hope for SARAH & Friends…
…then there’s new episodes of SARAH running out – now i hear plans of ANOTHER NEW SARAH next week…by the time FEB comes they’ll have but only 8 or 9 episodes left ulsee they take it to 24 episodes…FEB is looking farther and farther away.
December 8th, 2008 at 4:36 pm
What’s the most important aspect of these numbers? The 18-49 ratings share?