NFL opening week averages 21 million viewers per game

Sports News

Average viewership per match across television and digital platforms was up 12% from last year.

LOS ANGELES (AP) — The NFL averaged 21 million viewers per game during opening weekend, its highest-ever opening week viewership.

The league and Nielsen announced Wednesday morning that average viewership per game across television and digital platforms was up 12% from last year, after Nielsen began measuring viewership electronically in 1988.

In total, 123 million people watched at least part of one game, the most for an opening week since 2019.

“We’re off to a great start in terms of viewership and we’re very happy and excited to be back,” said Hans Schroeder, NFL executive vice president of media distribution.

The most-watched game was on NBC, where defending Super Bowl champion Kansas City’s 27-20 win over Baltimore in last Thursday’s season opener averaged 29.2 million television and digital viewers, making it NBC’s second-biggest regular season game since NBC acquired the “Sunday Night Football” package in 2006. Sunday night’s game between Detroit and the Los Angeles Rams, which the Lions won 26-20 in overtime, averaged 22.7 million viewers, up 3 percent from last year.

Tom Brady’s first game as Fox’s top commentator — Dallas’ 33-17 win over Cleveland — averaged 23.93 million viewers. Fox’s six-game doubleheader (four games in the early slot, two in the late slot) averaged 18.64 million viewers, the network’s best start to 2020 so far.

This will be the first time since 2020 that Fox has aired a Sunday afternoon doubleheader on its own in Week 1. For the past three seasons, CBS and Fox have each aired two games on Opening Sunday.

CBS averaged 17.79 million viewers for the six games, its most viewers for a single-header in Week 1 since reacquiring NFL rights in 1998. Most CBS affiliates aired the games in the 1:00 pm EDT time slot, with New York, Chicago, Atlanta and Pittsburgh showing Los Angeles Chargers coach Jim Harbaugh’s first game against the Las Vegas Raiders at 4:05 pm.

New York, Chicago, Atlanta and Pittsburgh were unable to air their games in an early CBS slot due to league rules that prohibit games from being broadcast at the same time as home teams’ games.

Philadelphia’s 34-29 win over Green Bay, the NFL’s first Week 1 Friday night game in 54 years, averaged 14 million viewers across Peacock and NBC affiliates in Philadelphia, Green Bay and Milwaukee, making it the second-most-watched live event in Peacock’s four-year history behind last season’s AFC Wild Card Round game between Kansas City and Miami.

“I think the numbers exceeded our expectations, Brazil looked great and the game was exciting,” Schroder said. “It’s a new night and a new time slot and I think it’s a phenomenal start for us.”

“Monday Night Football,” which aired on ABC, ESPN, ESPN2 and ESPN+, averaged 20.4 million viewers for San Francisco’s 32-19 win over the New York Jets, but most DirecTV customers couldn’t watch it due to a distribution dispute with Disney (the only way they could watch it was if the ABC affiliate wasn’t owned by Disney, which wasn’t the case for DirecTV customers in New York and San Francisco).

That average was down from $22.7 million for last year’s season opener between the Jets and Buffalo.