FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Tuesday, November 6th, 2018

AT NFL SEASON MIDPOINT, NBC SUNDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL VIEWERSHIP IS HIGHEST SINCE RECORD-SETTING 2015

SNF Viewership Up 8% From Last Year; Football Night in America Up 5% from 2017

Only Primetime TV Shows on Any Network to Deliver 20 Million Viewers This Fall Are Four NBC SNF Games

Rodgers vs. Brady on NBC Sunday Night Football Delivers Largest Week 9 SNF Audience Ever, With More than 24 Million Viewers

Green Bay-New England is TV’s Most-Watched Primetime Show Since Academy Awards in March

NBC Sports Digital’s SNF Average Minute Audience (AMA) for Season Up 81% From 2017

STAMFORD, Conn. – November 6, 2018 – “I’ll watch that,” said basketball legend Michael Jordan in NBC Sports’ spot promoting Aaron Rodgers and the Packers against Tom Brady and the Patriots on NBC Sunday Night Football this past weekend. Jordan wasn’t the only one, as New England’s 31-17 victory over Green Bay delivered a huge audience and boosted NBC Sunday Night Football to its highest midseason viewership in three years.

At the midway point of the NFL season, NBC Sunday Night Football, primetime TV’s #1 show for a history-making seven consecutive years, once again tops primetime television and is averaging a Total Audience Delivery of 19.7 million viewers – up 8% from last year at this point (18.3 million) and pacing for SNF’s best season since the record-setting 2015.

This past Sunday night, Packers-Patriots on NBC registered a Total Audience Delivery average of 24.1 million viewers – ranking as the most-watched Week 9 game in the 13-year history of SNF on NBC, and a 66% jump from last year’s Week 9 game (Raiders-Dolphins, 14.5 million), according to official national live + same day data released by Nielsen, and digital data from Adobe Analytics.

“With legendary matchups like Rodgers vs. Brady, exciting new players, high-scoring offenses, and compelling games, the NFL continues to deliver content and audiences unmatched by any property, year after year,” said Mark Lazarus, Chairman of NBC Broadcasting and Sports. “We’re looking forward to the second half of our schedule, which features many crucial divisional matchups, the Thanksgiving night game, plus the Week 17 flex game. We expect SNF to finish atop the primetime rankings yet again.”

Additional NBC Sunday Night Football metrics:

  • With an average of 23.7 million NBC-TV viewers for Packers-Patriots, this past weekend’s SNF game delivered the largest primetime audience on any network since the Academy Awards in March and the most-watched NFL telecast on any network this season.

 

  • NBC Sunday Night Football accounts for the only primetime shows (four games) on any network this fall to reach the 20 million viewer mark.

 

  • Seven of the past eight NBC SNF games have delivered larger audiences than the comparable game in 2017, with Sunday’s game ranking as the most-watched NFL primetime game on any network since Week 1 of 2017 (Giants-Cowboys on SNF).

 

  • Football Night in America, the most-watched weekly studio show in sports, delivered 8.7 million viewers on Sunday night — the best Week 9 delivery for FNIA since 2015 and up 17% since last year. For the season, FNIA is averaging 7.2 million viewers – up 5% from the comparable 7:30-8:15 p.m. ET time window through last year at this point.

 

  • The Average Minute Audience (AMA) for Sunday night’s live stream via NBC Sports Digital and NFL Digital platforms was 400,000 viewers – more than tripling last year’s Week 9 game (125,000 for Raiders-Dolphins). Fans consumed a record 85.3 million live streaming minutes across 1.8 million unique devices, up 207% and 213%, respectively, from last year’s Week 9 game. For the season, NBC Sports Digital’s AMA of 356,000 viewers is up 81% from last year through Week 9 (197,000).

 

  • Sunday’s game (8:24 p.m.-11:25 p.m. ET) registered a national TV household rating of 13.7/25.

On Monday, the NFL announced that the Nov. 18 game between the Chicago Bears and Minnesota Vikings — the respective first- and second-place teams in the NFC North – has been flexed into primetime on Sunday Night Football.

Following is the NBC SNF schedule for the remainder of the 2018 NFL season:

2018 NBC SUNDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL SCHEDULE
*Sun. Nov. 11 Week 10 Dallas Cowboys at Philadelphia Eagles
*Sun. Nov. 18 Week 11  Minnesota Vikings at Chicago Bears
**Thurs. Nov. 22 Week 12 Atlanta Falcons at New Orleans Saints
*Sun. Nov. 25 Week 12 Green Bay Packers at Minnesota Vikings
*Sun. Dec. 2 Week 13 San Francisco 49ers at Seattle Seahawks
*Sun. Dec. 9 Week 14 Pittsburgh Steelers at Oakland Raiders
*Sun. Dec. 16 Week 15 Philadelphia Eagles at Los Angeles Rams
*Sun. Dec. 23 Week 16 Kansas City Chiefs at Seattle Seahawks
*Sun. Dec. 30 Week 17 TBD
     

*Flex Week

** Thanksgiving Night Game

–SUNDAY NIGHT FOOTBALL–