Nine got week 40 off to a great start with a huge 52.4% share thanks to the closely-fought NRL grand final. This is the first time since the introduction of a night time grand final that Nine has topped the 50% mark. The previous highest was 49.3% in 2020.
The +2 million metro audience compared to 1.67 million in 2022, 2.2 million in 2022 and 2.1 million in 2020. With the addition of 9Now viewers the number will likely top all three results.
The game was the number one show in the three east coast markets while winning its timeslot in all markets.
Earlier, the entertainment did well to top 1 million while the Women’s Grand Final had 529,000 in the afternoon.
Seven News was ahead on Nine’s 30 minute bulletin that aired at various timeslots with +300k for Seven Melbourne.
Meanwhile Seven was competitive thanks to My Kitchen Rule, though down 50 – 60k on recent results it did well to top 500k.
ABC’s drama duo of Death in Paradise and Newsreader suffered with the competition while 10 managed just one top 20 entry for the night though The Project was up 20k week-on-week. ABC was down 5 points and 10 down 3 while SBS also dropped by 3.
Huge result, wasn’t expecting that high, Melbourne’s number the standout and difference, unreal.
I’d think regional and BVOD will be significantly higher than the AFL GF, but metro broadcast about 400k off, so total audience / VOZ could go down to the wire between the two, who’d have thought. Of course, Matildas will remain tops, by a cool double the AFL’s VOZ with 7.2m!
Massive MKR number in Melbourne up against NRL GF, nabbed some share and saved Seven’s night (along with news) or could’ve been a result like ABC’s.
Huge numbers and shares for the NRL Grand Final. Even in Melbourne.
The Women’s NRL Grand Final and State Championship Grand Final during the day did well too, both making the top 20 (as well as their pre-match and post match segments). Sports Sunday at 10am made a rare appearance.
Big audience for the NRL Grand Final particularly in Brisbane.
Seven’s decision to air a new episode of MKR saw it being the most-watched show in Perth after 7pm. MKR came second to NRL GF in Melbourne and Adelaide.
The new season premiere of The Graham Norton Show (featuring Kylie Minogue) missed the top 20.
Just IMO, I actually think surprisingly the weakest number (apart from Adelaide’s), especially given Broncos, I’d actually predicted 700k+ and wouldn’t have been shocked if they too made 800k - they’ve done it previously. Sydney’s was roughly what I expected (though Nine and NRL looking at Melbourne’s AFL might’ve liked more). But year Perth’s really good and Melbourne’s as touched on is rather unbelievable - no Storm either (even though for that reason you’d always expect NRL GF to rate better than Origin in Melbourne).
I think a lot of Sydney-siders and Brisbane people will have live streamed via 9Now, I think anywhere from 500k - 700k (!) we won’t know breakdowns, but add that to metro broadcast and could be looking at one of NRL’s strongest metro GFs ever (2.6m IIRC is record) and regional will surely nudge 1m.
Could even tie with AFL on 3.75m (though officially VOZ has it higher at 3.88m)
Over 200k in Melbourne against NRL GF though, what do you think Seven’s 7pm timeslot would’ve rated with something else (say ABBA then or Border or The Devil Wears Prada LOL) and also Seven’s shares?
Oh my God are you serious, Devil Wears Prada was actually a joke… It legit aired last year 100% being honest! Guess that shows how much it really airs.
I think that shows you don’t need to just ‘give up’ and ‘bow down’ to that night’s large event TV as a rival, for all we know Vic and Sa’s ratings might’ve been even higher for NRL GF had it not been for MKR (noting though Seven News also did massive there - affected by NRLWGF lead-in in those non-traditional territory).
I’m surprised at how close the Grand Final came to beating Seven News in Perth ( 132k v 147k) given there is some overlap timewise due to the 3 hr time difference.
It was Seven’s highest share against the NRL GF since 2019 when the network had 23.3% including The Real Dirty Dancing that managed 500k. (NRL was 1.87 m).
The NRL Grand Final is not going to beat the AFL. It’s already 420k behind on overnights.
I’m not sure why you are thinking there is going to be some sort of mammoth streaming audience. It would need to double last years streaming numbers or double the AFLs streaming numbers to even come close, which isn’t going to happen. Realistically it is going to gain around 1-1.2Million more with regional and streaming added in.
That’s a lower regional number than I predicted (though as seen with AFL GF yesterday should also go up a bit this arvo), given the AFL (with less regional penetration) rated just 40k under than, I thought maybe even could’ve cracked 1m. Is 9Now significant in regional Australia, maybe some there live streamed? I think 7Plus was behind the eight ball regionally due to (until recently) Prime7 branding.
So a 229k difference, with VOZ probably confirming the same this arvo or maybe will pull it back further in NRL’s favour by say 30k (margin might go under 200k).
While not a nearly 1m difference we saw during one of the COVID years, ~200k is still substantial, it’d be different story amongst media today had the margin been just tens of thousands or less.
I think, given both contests we saw, as well as Lions appearance, this is a better than expected result for NRL and a slightly underwhelming result for AFL, all things considered, IMO.
100% being honest! Guess that shows how much it really airs.