| Scoreboard |  |
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|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Rating/Share: Adults 18-49 | 10.0 | 2.8/8 | 1.4/4 | 1.3/4 | 1.2/3 | 0.4/1 |
| Rating/Share: Adults 18-34 | 7.6 | 1.7/5 | 1.4/4 | 0.9/3 | 1.0/3 | 0.4/1 |
| Total Viewers (million) | 28.84 | 11.06 | 3.52 | 5.32 | 3.42 | 1.27 |
The American Idol finale averaged 28.8 million and a 10.0 rating among adults 18-49 in time zone adjusted preliminary numbers between 8pm-10:07pm. Last year’s two hour Wednesday finale drew 30.6 million and a 11.0 rating with adults 18-49 in preliminary (non time zone adjusted) numbers. In the final live plus same day ratings numbers for last year’s finale, Idol wound up at 31.7 million and an 11.4 adults 18-49 rating. Since the time zone adjusted preliminary numbers will likely track closely with the finals it looks Idol was down around 9% in total viewers and 13% for adults 18-49. DVR viewing beyond the same night might bring things a little closer to last year, but we won’t know for a few weeks.
For anyone who cares, in the NON time-zone adjusted numbers, Idol averaged 27.71 million and a 9.6/27 (rating/share) with adults 18-49 between 8pm-10pm.
Only CBS even tried to put up a fight, with finales of Old Christine, Gary Unmarried and a two hour Criminal Minds finale (which performed admirably, given the circumstances!)
Update: data now included below and I’ve included the half hour data, plus the final seven minutes for Idol (check out those last 7 minutes!) Please note the Idol data is time-zone adjusted but the other shows/networks data below isn’t…
Previous Wednesday overnight reports are available for comparison.
Full details:
| Time | Net | Show | 18-49 Rating/Share | 18-34 Rating/Share | Viewers (Millons) |
| 8:00 | FOX | American Idol Finale (8pm-10:07) | 10.00 | 7.6 | 28.84 |
| CBS | New Adventures of Old Christine (Finale) | 1.6/5 | 1.0/4 | 5.65 | |
| NBC | Law & Order: CI | 1.1/3 | 0.6/2 | 4.96 | |
| ABC | Movie: Pirates of the Carribean (Dead Man..) | 1.0/3 | 1.0/3 | 3.42 | |
| CW | Movie: Take the Lead | 0.4/1 | 0.4/2 | 1.24 | |
| 8:30 | CBS | Gary Unmarried (Finale) | 1.7/5 | 1.0/3 | 5.55 |
| 9:00 | CBS | Criminal Minds (Finale) | 3.1/8 | 1.9/6 | 12.40 |
| ABC | Movie: Pirates of the Carribean (Dead Man..) | 1.2/3 | 1.1/3 | 3.27 | |
| NBC | Law & Order: SVU (R) | 1.0/3 | 0.7/2 | 4.30 | |
| CW | Movie: Take the Lead | 0.5/1 | 0.5/2 | 1.30 | |
| 10:00 | CBS | Criminal Minds (Finale) | 3.9/10 | 2.2/7 | 15.17 |
| NBC | Law & Order | 1.9/5 | 1.4/4 | 6.70 | |
| ABC | Movie: Pirates of the Carribean (Dead Man..) | 1.3/3 | 1.2/3 | 3.58 | |
| 8:00 | American Idol Finale | 7.80 | 6 | 23.22 | |
| 8:30 | American Idol Finale | 8.90 | 6.6 | 26.53 | |
| 9:00 | American Idol Finale | 10.50 | 7.8 | 30.13 | |
| 9:30 | American Idol Finale | 11.70 | 9 | 32.85 | |
| 10:00-10:07 | American Idol Finale | 14.90 | 11.8 | 40.10 |
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Shows are sorted by Adults 18-49 rating in each time slot.
Nielsen TV Ratings: ©2009 The Nielsen Company. All Rights Reserved.
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.
Glad Kris won.
Those are some pretty poor AI finale numbers — maybe everyone just “assumed” Adam would win and didn’t bother tuning in?
(what a shock THEY probably got!)
full data now posted.
while fox doesn’t want to be down 13%, I think this previous post is the most telling. http://tvbythenumbers.com/2009/05/11/american-idol-will-be-raking-in-the-cash-for-years-or-at-least-until-2016/18451
my god 40 million in the last 7 minutes….
“10pm
NBC — Law & Order — 1.7/4 A18-49, 6.087 million viewers
10:30pm
NBC — L&O — 2.2/6 A18-49, 7.305 million viewers”
Nice jump at 10:30pm. Law & Order is still one of the best hour on TV.
Wow at Criminal Minds. It actually was able to put up some numbers against Idol.
I think between 26-40 million viewers is not poor. I know that this website is totally obsessed with the 18-49 share, but when you look at the big TV events in history (Who Shot JR, MASH Finale, Superbowl, etc.) nobody looks at the 18-49 share, they look at raw millions.
And 30 million is not too bad in today’s era of DVR and Youtube, and for a show that is in season # 8.
How nice of “American Idol” to address our great celebrity shortage by supplying yet another one. Whatever would we do without them? Imagine a world where talen had to be cultivated and grown instead of foist upon us.
It’s amazing to me that they suck 30 million people into this junk, but then, nobody ever lost money underestimating the intelligence of the American public.
Alan, I think referring to total viewers and average viewers is completely appropriate for “historical” shows/events. It’s a benchmark that everyone can relate to.
What we try and help folks understand is that average viewership doesn’t pay the bills (or keep shows on the air), adults 18-49 viewership does.
Is it the first week since forever that L&O won vs SVU ?
Anyway, NBC is like completely depending on Law & Order franchise. How many hours of L&O this week ? I’m sure no less than 6 hours.
Judging by the 40 million people at the last seven minutes, looks like plenty of people tuned in for the important part – the winner
.
Alexis, next fall on NBC, out of 18 hours of NBC non-sports prime-time programming, Jay Leno will be reponsible for 5, and Dick Wolf (Law & Order creator) will be responsible for 3
Why in the world did CBS keep Gary unmarried?
Gary Unmarried (Finale) 1.7/5 1.0/3 5.55
Worst Week did better numbers than that.
I love how some people who don’t like AI think it’s fine to insult the intelligence of those who do. How classy.
Those are good numbers, keeping in mind that most everything is down from last year. Though I wanted Adam to win. Kris was good too, though.
Worst Week didn’t face the American Idol finale, so I’m not sure of the value of such comparisons. Worst Week also aired after Two and a Half Men — it could be argued Gary Unmarried would do just as well in that time slot as Worst Week did.
CBS New Adventures of Old Christine (Finale) 1.6/5 1.0/4 5.65
CBS Gary Unmarried (Finale) 1.7/5 1.0/3 5.55
Yeah, that’s not a problem or anything. Let’s just change 7 and a half other hours instead and keep this the same.
There is nothing to like about American Idol. It is a facade, wrapped up in a cheap, hyped-up production, wrapped up in a Disney Channel special. The fact that so many Americans watch it every week and get wrapped up in what is clearly preordained and orchestrated far ahead of time…
American idol numbers are great compared to the show average this year…
and i suspect that in this case with DVR the numbers could surpass last season.
NCIS spin-off at 8 pm next season was the best option for CBS. however they don’t think like me…
CM with a lead-in above 12 millions viewers easily make the same numbers of CSI (15/16 millions viewers 3.5-40 in the demo)…
CBS was not cleaver with the moves they did. but let’s wait for next season to see what happens…
The last 7 minutes includes a TON of people waiting for the 10 o’clock news to come on their local Fox station.
The lad in the middle of that photo looks like he just had a party in his trousers. As you can tell I do not watch AI.
The last 7 minutes of Idol had it’s highest ratings numbers. But since that 7 minutes was from 10 to 10:07, can Idol really take the credit for the spike?
Wouldn’t new viewers tuning in at 10 have assumed that Idol was already over and so they were really there looking for the local news?
Alicia, Red unfortunately we didn’t see 15 minute ratings from 9:30p-10p, it would have given more insight. My guess (just a guess) is that most of the spike is Idol related, but some small portion of it being those looking for the 10pm news.
I didn’t tune into Idol till 10:00 to see the winner. And I am very happy that Kris won, if I had to hear Adam screech one more time……
I don’t believe that spike is related with local news… this is to remote for me…
In my opinion is Idol effect only.
Not Bad. Ridiculous.
Competition was crushed needless to say.
How long will it take before the 18-34 age demoraphic becomes the new 18-49 age demographic in terms of the demographic most advertisers will pursue and place a premium on? Because if that would be the case NBC and CBS could soon face a reversal of fortunes…
Canadiens05 I agree with you… 18-49 the new 18-34 and 25-54 the new 18-49.
To get 28 million viewers much less 40 million in these days is amazing because everyone watches shows later. 28 million is amazing these days!
Good to see the ‘Criminal minds’ finale doing well against AI. It was a good finale, too.
Joey: Precisely. How else could one explain how 100,000 “contestants” are whittled down to 10? The only way it could logically happen is to have the finalists pre-selected prior to auditioning, otherwise oddballs would slip through the process. It’d be too difficult to manage.
To say it’s fixed is a leap, but I’d say that at least the finalists are pre-ordained, which is tantamount to fixing, since all those poor slobs who wait in nearly endless lines to sing are ultimately wasting their time. All it does is provide a few hours of show time, which is what the franchise is all about these days.
Feel free to read more disdain on my blog by searching American Idol.
“Criminal Minds” is in a great position of being a solid performer but not having to worry about the pressure of being one.
The A1849 demo should be far more secondary than it is. The average viewer is 50 now. And if a 2.0 is the benchmark now, it can only go down from there. What will we look at then?
This is why the overall numbers are going down. If A1849 is the benchmark and popular shows with solid viewership but low A1849 numbers keep getting cancelled, viewership overall is going to continue to fall.
Advertisers have to go where the viewers are. It doesn’t work the other way around.
I have a question about Idol vote count. The figure 100,000,000
votes last night sound just too high. Can Idol voters
call multiple times or does the whole universe plus
Venus vote?
I really don’t buy the argument that the 40 million for 10:00-10:07 can be explained away by people tuning in for the local news. I’d agree with Robert in that I’d guess the vast majority of that spike is carried over from the final quarter of Idol and people tuning in specifically to see who won.
And opposite Idol Criminal Minds actually did surprisingly well.
Michael Idol viewers can (and clearly do) vote multiple times.
Criminal Minds was amazing last night. I can’t believe how great that show does with a horrible lead in! I think CM is now bigger than CSI on Thursday. CSI doesn’t have to face AI which would not be pretty. GA only gets 1/2 the numbers of AI.
“I have a question about Idol vote count. The figure 100,000,000
votes last night sound just too high.”
I’m sure those numbers are exaggerated to a ridiculous extent.
OK, im gonna go out on limb and suggest “Idol” is still pretty popular.
just throwin’ that out there…
If people tuned it at 10:00 for the news idol mustve got a great 60-99 demo rating in that time period….lol.
This show is a phenomenon – like baseball, and football. People get emotional about which “team” their on/ Its become a new sport, only its American Idol.
40 million people watch to see if their favorite won – thats crazy. Crazy numbers.
8th season of this show is still extremely strong.
That was an incredible finale. These stars, including Kiss, Rob Stewart, and Queen, must feel honored to be on this show. It lets 30 – 40 million people watch them perform.
They have a more entertaining show than the Grammys, or ACMs, or CMAs, or AMAs combined. If Idol can get these huge, entertaining, surprising acts, to perform – why cant the Grammys be more entertaining like this is??
Let me get this straight, so to speak. Christine and Gary get picked up and Without a Trace gets cancelled? I understand that it’s expensive to produce, but this is the most annoying cancellation since Trial by Jury.
Canadiens05, for broadcast TV networks, 18-49 has been the target for a very long time, so I don’t anticipate any general trend to 18-34. But various cable networks target different, and often much narrower, audience groups.
Rejoining this discussion long after it started. Effectively none of that 40 million audience is people tuning in for their local 10pm newscasts. I’d be surprised if the total average audience for Fox local 10pm news is 3 million people. (although I will be alert for a Fox PR email correcting me!)
“American Idol” wrapped its eighth season Wednesday with the lowest rating ever in the 18-49 demographic for an “Idol” finale.
Since I’ve heard repeatedly that the FOX affiliates LOVE the 10 pm newscasts and make a lot of money from that hour, I doubt it’s that low. Granted, it’s not 40 million, but I’d guess higher than 3.
Yeah, I agree with Holly.
It has to be said when your lowest finale rating is around 30 million and 10 in the 18-49 you’re still doing pretty good…
I dint care for American Idol this season, yeaterday I watched Take the Lead on the CW.
Kudos to “Criminal Minds” for their finale numbers. Not bad in direct competition to AI. It was a good show. Didn’t like what the ending seems to say.
What’s the fuss about Criminal Mindes ratings. Lost season finales had been up against AI finales and about double the ratings Criminal Mindes had.
Tom, check your math. Double Criminal Minds is 7.
Wow, a 13% drop from last season. AI will be cancelled for sure…
Criminal Minds was amazing last night. I’d love it if they had more two hour episodes. It allowed for a much more expansive storyline. I think now there’s little question that CM is CBS’ biggest crime drama, ahead of all the CSIs. Against monster competition it did better than they usually do.
Joe Criminal Minds did well against the Idol Finale but it didn’t perform better than the rest of the CBS line-up until 10, when Idol was off the air and its competition was Law & Order.
[i]For anyone who cares, in the NON time-zone adjusted numbers….[/i]
I find them interesting, thanks.
Dagnabit.
Those numbers are INSANE! I guess fox will never let that show go for MANY years to come lol.
Nice job American Idol!
Where are the DVR ratings for the past two weeks?
Miranda, the DVR numbers are still with the folks that usually send them to us. They’re busy these days, we should see them again soon, I hope.
Dennis says:
May 21st, 2009 at 1:55 pm
Wow, a 13% drop from last season. AI will be cancelled for sure…
Are you kidding, there is no way FOX would cancel it. Not when they are still getting decent ratings. That would be like all the networks canceling all there number one shows and keeping their worst rating….Dollhouse,Chuck Termination…the list goes on.
Terminator**
That’s ridiculous… AI I mean.
However, I’m happy to see the CM numbers. Good for them.
I know 18-49 is the advertising currency, but I think AI’s 18-34 pull is much more impressive. Nothing else on earth–TV show or otherwise–will pull more than 10 percent of this diverse and energetic group ever again.
Maybe that 40 million in the last 7 minutes could be a message to Fox to shorten the finale. 2 hours just to hear who won is ridiculous.
I 100% agree Seppy. The show was too long and was filled with money grabbing TV garbage..and Ryan Seacrest. I checked FOX few times but I just couldn’t stomach the silly “bit’s they had on there. I mean, Golden Idol Awards?….Lame. That pathetic chick in the bikini and then that new judge pretending to be hip by ripping her clothes off. What the hell is this? Hogan Knows Best?
On Tuesday’s show, Ryan Seacrest told the viewers that they would go past 10PM on Wednesday. And if you’ve watched a past Idol finale — you know that they save the best for 5 minutes after the show was supposed to be over. Maybe a small percentage was looking for the local news, but I think that most people were there for AI. They may have tuned in at 9:50 or so, and waited until 10:07 when the Idol was revealed.
God Particle:
The nearly 100 million votes is not exagerated but is actually officially verified by a professional private firm. The vote goes in the World Record books every year.
Oh and ADAM should have won!
I bet this happened
10:00: 40 Million
Kris announced winner: 11.22 Million.
AI got just about as many viewers as Obama did on his little 100 day event. Isn’t that special?
Wow Criminal Minds has 15 million viewers against Idol’s finale!
More people watch Criminal Minds’ finale than CSI’s and CSI: Miami’s finales
haelohm says:
“The nearly 100 million votes is not exagerated but is actually officially verified by a professional private firm.”
If it were, one would think that fact would be mentioned somewhere on the Idol Web site. I’ve yet to find any such mention.
everybody is ‘down from last year’.. the show still wiped the floor with all the competition as it does every week. the finale was quite entertaining with some big name performers like cyndi lauper, rod stewart, and keith urban dueting with the contestants.. and the comedy bits actually worked. i’m no fan of kara, but her duet with ‘bikini girl’ was a riot. sorry that the season is over, but glad that cutie-pie kris won. i was sick of adam’s theatrics and screeching weeks ago. of course, they all end up with recording contracts so ‘winning’ doesn’t really mean all that much.
Shorten the finale? Why in the world would Fox want to do that, when they can get more than 30 million viewers at every point along the span of more than two hours? I think it’s safe to say that most of us who watch the entire finale enjoy a great deal of it. If we just wanted to see the announcement of the winner, it’s perfectly easy to tune in for only the last few minutes of the show. Yet year after year, the entire finale draws huge numbers. Fox must make a fortune off of that alone.
Should have looked at the table again. 23 million viewers to start, and of course it went way up from there. I wonder exactly how much $ Fox did make off of it?
So..who gives a rat’s behind..this is junk children..junk!
If you look at the numbers they were building throughout the show. So 40 million in the last seven is not a surprise, if those had turned in for the new they would have switched channels not waited 7 minutes. Also, not taken into consideration was twitter, it was stirring things up online and I think caused more people to tune it to see what was up.
Let’s face it folks, AI is a family show. You can sit down with your kids and not have to worry about sexual inuendos every 5 minutes. Communities all over the US are having I parties. Get with it, beyond the ratings, it is a throw back but with a modern touch.
The last seven minutes ran from 10:00 PM to 10:07 PM, a time when the local news program is normally being shown on Fox. I, for one, was tuned to Fox during that time period waiting in agony for Idol to finally end so that the news and weather would start. I pity those to whom the outcome of this farce was of critical importance in their lives.
Well done on a great website – this is my first time posting. I’m afraid I couldn’t let some of these comments lie!
As a TV producer myself, who mainly works in the reality TV world, I just wanted to weigh in. I’ve never worked on Idol – though have done similar shows…
Firstly 40 million for a show in its 8th season is nothing short of incredible… yes the figures were down but I can’t really see Fox being too worried by that kind of slippage.
I do also find it hilarious that Chuck fans who work themselves into a frenzy if their show goes up or down 0.1 of a share are being so critical of Idol’s figures!
I also love that every time a reality show does well it’s slammed as ‘TV for idiots’ by people on this site who feel their own shows – Chuck, Dollhouse, TSCC – are vastly superior and smarter.
For me reality is a genre – just like any other – and there’s good shows and bad shows. I love 24, Mad Men, Damages, Housewives – but I also think Biggest Loser and Project Runway are great shows and very well produced. And the Idol finale show was better than most awards shows out there – strong performances, well paced, funny in places. By the same token, many of the cable reality shows and ‘overproduced’ network reality shows – just aren’t very well done. But don’t damn the whole genre – especially if you never watch the shows in question.
Oh and to answer the conspiracy theorists – Idol probably did have 100 million votes – there’s pretty tight rules on these things because it’s a competition. And though I do think the judges have favorites – as do viewers – contestants aren’t pre-selected and the show isn’t fixed. That’s just a lazy suggestion.
But I agree that Dancing With The Stars is truly dreadful!
It’s a shame that some people waited until the end to tune in. That was one of the best variety shows I’ve ever seen on TV, and I’m 68 years old. I love the way non Idol fans like to critique something they don’t watch and always have all the answers. Why don’t they let those of us who enjoy idol enjoy it. I don’t fuss when they watch wrestling or other things I don’t enjoy. Reporting that the ratings were down for the finale is silly. Ratilngs for ALL TV watching is WAY down, but they never bother to point that out either.
There’s a difference between glory and filthy lucre. Even the purist New York Times Yearly Almanac gives prominent place to all-time top total viewership. Dark Knight, Iron Man, Harry Potter etc put up the huge numbers and never get a sniff at the Oscars, which is what people in the future will remember. Jackie Robinson was never one of the most highly paid ballplayers. And Rembrandt and Van Gogh died penniless. We should all be so lucky as that very few who have both … maybe our friends here are in the right business to get that accomplished someday.
Damn, that post was almost incoherent. I should have distinguished between the talent and executives. MASH and Who Shot JR etc get the glory, execs who figure out just how to manipulate enough impressionable and even desperate and harassed young consumers to justify keeping their jobs get the loot. And today those same execs are buying up Rembrants and Van Goghs. There, that made a little more sense.
KISS still rules!! what a show. Best finale ever.
Scott:
And I pity those who get their news from a Fox affiliate
That’s funny. That number with Adam and Kiss made me glad he didn’t win. I hate that kind of junk. To me that’s not music it’s noise and a turn off. Kris singing Ain’t No Sunshine or Heartless (beautifully too, he deserved to win) is real music.
lambert finally woke up that although he loves broadway, we like our rock pure.
Go back to sleep, Jill. Talk to me about real music after Kris is 35 years into his career, has sold over 100 million records, and grossed a few billion dollars.
I wonder if that little man “perez hilton” threw a hissy fit because his guy did not win.
Additionally, it is nice to see FOX beat the pants off the competition once again. The other “left wing” networks still do not understand what the majority of America likes to watch.
To Chris the TV sage:
“Fair and Balanced”! I’m sorry that you are in the minority, according to the ratings. Besides, it was the local affiliate and the local news, so put the claws back in. Save the pity for those (very few) who are hoping to get their news from the watching the networks or their pet cable shows.
Dave is obviously a moron of the first degree. He believes Kris can’t be a good musician or singer until he’s in his fifties. LOLOL!!!!!!!! What an idiot!!! Sorry, Dave, I enjoyed Kris’ beautiful singing RIGHT NOW at age 23 and I do not have to apologize for that. Seems to me that you are a frustrated singer yourself and jealous of Kris’ success. You’re too transparent, Dave.
Julia: I was looking at the first hour numbers. I don’t remember the exact number but the second hour was definitaly above 7.0 in the demo.
Isn’t it nice that we can check past weeks’ ratings? Lost got 4.4 in its second hour. No where near 7.0. And not double even Criminal Minds’ first hour.
Criminal Minds is just plain disturbing to watch. It is bizarre and half of what they show should not be on TV.
It give the wrong ideas.
Scott: Fully aware you are talking about the FOX affiliate. I have yet to see any of them put on a decent newscast.
And you might want to check the meaning of the word “majority”. Get back to me when *any* news show gets a 50.1 share.
Okay, all done. I will not delve into political ranting, I will not delve into political ranting…
In other ratings websites they said it only got 34 million viewers in total.
Wendy, I’m not sure what you are talking about, the broadcast finals were in line with the time zone adjusted fast nationals — 28.838 million from 8p-10:07. Those are definitely the numbers for the whole broadcast.
The 40 million was just from 10p-10:07p. I have no idea what the 34 million you’re referring to is.
Wendy, the average from 9:30-10:07 is 34.22 mil. Perhaps that’s what they are referring to?