ratings

Boosted by Mexico’s run in men’s soccer, NBCUniversal’s Spanish-language network, Telemundo, scored viewership records for Olympics coverage. Telemundo said Monday that 22.5 million viewers watched a portion of its coverage of the London Olympics over the 17 days.

NBC finished its London Olympics on another high note — beating the Closing Ceremonies ratings compared to the Beijing Games four years ago. NBC took in a big Nielsen preliminary 9.1 rating/23 share between 8:30 p.m. and 11 p.m. for the XXX Olympics Closing Ceremony. The network recorded 30.6 million viewers on the 17th day of the big quadrennial event, just a bit under its 31.1 million average over 16 prime-time nights. This bests the Beijing Games by 12%.

CBS’s Big Brother was once again the top-rated show against the final night of NBC’s Olympics coverage. Brother, whose start time was delayed 14 minutes to 8:14 p.m. by overrun from the PGA Championship earlier in the evening, averaged a 1.9 adults 18-49 rating. Ratings for NBC’s closing ceremony, and the sneak preview of new show Animal Practice the followed, will not be out until later today, but early indications are that the ceremony was way up from Beijing four years ago.

The group owners’ stations in three markets are now using Rentrak’s census-based local TV measurement currency.

Through Saturday night, NBC was averaging 31.1 million total viewers from 9 p.m. to 11:25 p.m., according to Nielsen, up 12% over the first 16 nights of the Beijing Games, which averaged 27.7 million. London remained on pace for the second-best viewership since the 1976 Games and the best viewership for a non-U.S. hosted event in 36 years.

Here’s a notable Olympic first: Three original Big Four shows saw week-to-week gains against the Games last night, something that had not happened over the previous two weeks.ABC’s Wipeout, Rookie Blue and CBS’s Big Brother all registered improvements.

Big Brother‘s Wednesday edition fell a bit against NBC’s Olympics last night, tying with Univision’s La Que No Podia Amar as the No. 1 non-sports show on broadcast. Brother averaged a 1.8 adults 18-49 rating at 8 p.m., down 10% from a 2.0 last week. It marked a season low for the show, now in its 14th year. Still, it’s a decent rating against the most dominant Summer Games since 1996. And Brother‘s rating has been going up a tenth of late when final numbers come in.

Olympics coverage thoroughly dominated television last week, as expected. Its ratings were better than NBC expected and turned what was anticipated to be a money-losing event into one that will break even or perhaps finish in the black.

Univision continued to be the top non-Olympics broadcast network last night with ABC, CBS and Fox largely in reruns.The Spanish-language network had the night’s top non-Games show, La Que No Podia Amar, which averaged a 1.7 adults 18-49 rating. The 10 p.m. show has ranked either first or second to the Games every weeknight since they began more than a week ago.

Nothing has helped the recently flagging fortunes of NBC News like the injection of large audiences after coverage of the Olympics on the network this summer. NBC Nightly News with Brian Williams is the latest example.

News following the killings in Colorado drive up numbers for syndicated magazine shows in the week ending July 29.

ABC’s originals continued to struggle against very tough competition from the Olympics. Bachelor Pad fell to another series low last night. The reality show averaged a  1.0 adults 18-49 rating from 8 to 10 p.m., down 9% from last week, its previous series low. The network’s other Monday reality program, The Glass House, was even with last week with a 0.6 at 10 p.m.

The Mississippi NBC and Fox affiliates bring the number of stations using to Rentrak’s Census-Based Local TV Measurement Currency to 182 in 41 markets.

English-language television executives and advertisers desperately want to appeal to the more than 50 million Latinos in the United States (about three-quarters speak Spanish), especially those who are young, bilingual and bicultural, but those viewers seem to want very little to do with American English-language television. Shows meant to reach out to Hispanic viewers often rely on boilerplate characters that fall flat.

NBC has been slammed by viewers and media pundits for its coverage of the London Olympics, but Madison Avenue wouldn’t change a thing. Especially not the tape delay. The first five nights of the games averaged 35.6 million viewers, the most for any Summer Olympics outside the U.S. since Montreal in 1976. That’s significantly better than even NBC parent Comcast had expected.

Big Brother continued to generate okay ratings opposite NBC’s Olympics, but ABC’s Wipeout took a dive on another slow night for the other broadcasters. Brother averaged a 1.9 adults 18-49 rating at 9 p.m., equal to Wednesday night’s rating and matching a season low. But the show seems to be holding steady, with a similar rating on Sunday night. Though it’s not putting up big ratings against the Games, it’s not taking a big hit, either.

The company says its KUSA Denver and KARE Minneapolis averaged a 51 and 49 share, respectively, among adults 25-54 during the first six nights of primetime coverage. In addition, it says all top-25 market Gannett NBC affils ranked in top 10.

Big Brother‘s audience remained fairly stable, all things considered, against NBC’s dominating Olympics broadcast last night. The veteran CBS show averaged a 1.9 adults 18-49 rating at 8 p.m., matching its rating on Sunday night. The show was down 5% from the same night last week, when it did not face the Games, but it was the top-rated non-Olympic program.

Univision’s viewership held up well against NBC’s dominating Olympics last night. The network had the best non-sports rating of the night with the rest of the Big Four besides NBC airing mostly repeats. Univision averaged a 1.4 adults 18-49 rating and 4 share in primetime, led by a 1.7 for the 10 p.m. telenovela La Que No Podia Amar. It marked the second straight night that Amar was the highest-rated non-Olympic show on broadcast. It finished with a 1.6 rating on Monday night.

NBC’s London Olympics coverage is now four for four, as in four nights of increased ratings over 2008. Monday night’s primetime coverage, including the men’s gymnastics team finals and Missy Franklin’s 100-meter backstroke victory, averaged 31.6 million total viewers from 8 p.m. to 11:23 p.m. It was the most-watched first Monday of a non-U.S.-hosted Summer Olympics since 1976, and it marked the fourth straight night that the games drew 31 million viewers or more.

Talk shows, some courtrooms, a couple of games and off-net sitcoms show some ratings improvement in the week ending July 20.

Viewers continued to choose the Olympics over other original fare on competing networks last night. ABC’s Bachelor Pad and The Glass House saw week-to-week declines airing against NBC’s highly rated Games coverage. Pad slid 27% from last week’s season premiere to a 1.1 adults 18-49 rating from 8 to 10 p.m., a series low for the three-year-old show.

Despite all the agita over NBC’s coverage of the 2012 London Olympic Games, fans continue to tune in to the primetime broadcasts in record numbers.

It’s always a risk to continue airing original programming against the highly rated Olympics, and yesterday CBS saw why. Ratings for Big Brother and the new dating show 3 slipped against NBC’s coverage of the Games. Brother averaged a 1.8 adults 18-49 rating at 8 p.m., down 10% from last week and a season low.

Love was in the air last night on Wipeout with a special blind date edition that lifted the show to its best rating this summer. Wipeout averaged a 2.2 adults 18-49 rating from 8 to 10 p.m., up 29% from last week. The show drew its best rating since Jan. 12, and surged to a 2.5 during its final hour, besting CBS’s competing Big Brother in the hour by 0.3.

Fox won yet another Wednesday night according to overnight ratings that were delayed for more than five hours Thursday afternoon due to Nielsen processing errors. The network averaged a 1.7 adults 18-49 rating and 5 share in primetime, just barely ahead of second-place NBC at 1.6/5. So You Think You Can Dance took up Fox’s entire primetime schedule, falling a tenth of a point from last week.

The increasingly intense competition between NBC’s Today and ABC’s Good Morning America took its latest twist last week when the shows produced — in the Nielsen rating sample anyway — a flat-footed, photo-finish tie in the audience measure that counts the most among advertisers.

Fox cooked up its fifth Tuesday victory in a row last night with both of its Gordon Ramsay reality cooking shows hitting Tuesday season highs. Hell’s Kitchen and MasterChef both averaged a 2.6 adults 18-49 rating, tying NBC’s America’s Got Talent as the top show of the night.

Other first-run shows doing well in the week ending July 15 were Excused, Bethenny, Wheel of Fortune and Jeopardy.

Apparently the interest in The Bachelorette didn’t carry over to Bachelor Pad. The Bachelor spinoff premiered to a series low last night, one night after Bachelorette closed out on a season high. Pad averaged a 1.4 adults 18-49 rating from 8 to 10 p.m., down 36% from last summer’s premiere, which averaged a series-high 2.2.

Among online video viewers, about 44% of TV viewers and 31% of moviegoers say watching a preview was the biggest factor in seeing the flick or checking out the show, according to online video technology provider Videology.

Posting the biggest rating drop in its history this past season, Fox’s American Idol, the biggest non-sports TV series in the U.S., needs changes. But it may not be enough to put Fox on top by the end of next season.

ABC’s decision to move The Bachelorette finale from Monday to Sunday was a good one. The season-ender drew a season-high rating and was up over last year. Bachelorette averaged a 3.0 in adults 18-49 from 8 to 10 p.m., 7% better than last year’s finale, which averaged a 2.8. It marked ABC’s best non-sports summer numbers in the timeslot in six years.

Big Brother helped CBS to another Thursday win, but the show’s rating declined in its second week. Brother averaged a 2.2 adults 18-49 rating at 9 p.m. last night, dropping 15% from last week’s season premiere, which averaged a 2.6. The show has been down year-to-year in all four of its outings thus far, though last night’s episode did rebound from a 1.9 on Wednesday night.

Fox’s So You Think You Can Dance wasn’t last night’s highest-rated show, but it did give the network the night’s most consistent performance. Dance averaged a 1.8 adults 18-49 rating from 8 to 10 p.m., down 10% from last week. The decline was likely from the increase in competition. CBS’s Big Brother made its Wednesday debut yesterday, and it finished in a tie for first on the night with NBC’s America’s Got Talent.

Fox’s Gordon Ramsay shows continued to cook up wins for the network last night. Hell’s Kitchen and MasterChef both saw gains versus their most recent outings, boosting the network to its best non-sports Tuesday night of the summer. Fox averaged a 2.5 adults 18-49 rating and 8 share in primetime, comfortably ahead of second-place NBC at 2.2/6.