Yall remember when people said the NFL was dying? All of yall who said you were boycotting the NFL lied. This game put up the same viewership numbers as the Chiefs vs. Bill AFC Championship game.
www.sportsmediawatch.com
The NFL Thanksgiving Day games delivered as expected, officially ranking as the league’s two most-watched regular season games on record.
Last Thursday’s Chiefs-Cowboys NFL Thanksgiving Day game averaged a 15.1 rating and 57.23 million viewers on CBS, marking the largest NFL regular season audience on record and a 47 percent increase over Giants-Cowboys on FOX last year (38.84M).
The Cowboys’ win, which peaked with more than 61 million viewers in the final quarter-hour, delivered the third-largest television audience of the year behind the Super Bowl in February (127.7M) and the Bills-Chiefs AFC Championship on CBS in January (57.7M).
Keep in mind that Nielsen did not begin tracking out-of-home viewing its estimates until 2020 and did not do so in 100 percent of markets until February of this year, meaning that prior year figures — all the way up through the aforementioned Bills-Chiefs AFC title game — include less out-of-home viewing (if any at all).
Nielsen also shifted to a new “Big Data + Panel” metric in September that combines data from smart TVs and set-top boxes with its traditional panel. While that generally results in larger audiences, there is precedent for viewership being lower under “Big Data + Panel” than the prior panel-only metric. The out-of-home change is far more likely to have driven the viewership record than the shift to “Big Data + Panel.”
But while the Nielsen changes are almost certainly the reason viewership hit an all-time high, there is no question that the game was a bigger-than-normal draw. The 15.1 household rating — which by definition does not include out-of-home viewing — is the highest for a Thanksgiving NFL game since Dolphins-Cowboys on CBS in 1999 (16.1).
Earlier in the day, FOX averaged 47.7 million for Packers-Lions, ranking as the second-largest NFL regular season audience on record. The Packers’ win, which peaked with 57.96 million in the 4 PM ET quarter-hour, increased 28% from Bears-Lions on CBS last year (37.4M).
NFL Thanksgiving games set expected records, with over 57M for Chiefs-Cowboys
The NFL Thanksgiving Day games delivered as expected, officially ranking as the league's two most-watched regular season games on record.
www.sportsmediawatch.com
NFL Thanksgiving games set expected records, with over 57M for Chiefs-Cowboys
The NFL Thanksgiving Day games delivered as expected, officially ranking as the league’s two most-watched regular season games on record.
Last Thursday’s Chiefs-Cowboys NFL Thanksgiving Day game averaged a 15.1 rating and 57.23 million viewers on CBS, marking the largest NFL regular season audience on record and a 47 percent increase over Giants-Cowboys on FOX last year (38.84M).
The Cowboys’ win, which peaked with more than 61 million viewers in the final quarter-hour, delivered the third-largest television audience of the year behind the Super Bowl in February (127.7M) and the Bills-Chiefs AFC Championship on CBS in January (57.7M).
Keep in mind that Nielsen did not begin tracking out-of-home viewing its estimates until 2020 and did not do so in 100 percent of markets until February of this year, meaning that prior year figures — all the way up through the aforementioned Bills-Chiefs AFC title game — include less out-of-home viewing (if any at all).
Nielsen also shifted to a new “Big Data + Panel” metric in September that combines data from smart TVs and set-top boxes with its traditional panel. While that generally results in larger audiences, there is precedent for viewership being lower under “Big Data + Panel” than the prior panel-only metric. The out-of-home change is far more likely to have driven the viewership record than the shift to “Big Data + Panel.”
But while the Nielsen changes are almost certainly the reason viewership hit an all-time high, there is no question that the game was a bigger-than-normal draw. The 15.1 household rating — which by definition does not include out-of-home viewing — is the highest for a Thanksgiving NFL game since Dolphins-Cowboys on CBS in 1999 (16.1).
Earlier in the day, FOX averaged 47.7 million for Packers-Lions, ranking as the second-largest NFL regular season audience on record. The Packers’ win, which peaked with 57.96 million in the 4 PM ET quarter-hour, increased 28% from Bears-Lions on CBS last year (37.4M).
