UPDATED: The beginning of the 2018 Winter Olympics from Pyeongchang, South Korea, handily topped the broadcast ratings on Thursday night but was down from the beginning of the 2014 Sochi Olympics.
The coverage of the games delivered a 3.7 rating in adults 18-49 and 17.2 million viewers across NBC, NBC Sports, and NBC’s streaming platforms. Coverage on NBC alone pulled in 16 million of those viewers. That is down 38 percent in the demo compared to the beginning of the Sochi games and 14 percent in total viewers (6.0, 20 million). It should be noted that the Sochi Olympics had no simultaneous live streaming and no competing primetime Olympic cable coverage.
Airing live on the East Coast from 8 p.m.-11 p.m. on NBC and NBC Sports, the Olympics coverage drew a combined 11.1 rating in metered market households. That is a drop off of just six percent from the 2014 Winter Olympics, which drew an 11.8. In fairness, however, the first coverage of the 2014 Olympics was just carried on NBC.
Elsewhere on broadcast, most original programming was down unless otherwise noted.
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For ABC: “Grey’s Anatomy” (2.0, 7.3 million); “Scandal” (1.1, 4.6 million); “How to Get Away With Murder” (0.8, 3.3 million).
For CBS: “Big Brother: Celebrity Edition” (1.4, 5.6 million), followed by repeats.
On Fox: the finale of “The Four” (1.3, 4 million) ticked up in total viewers and held even in the demo.
On The CW, “Supernatural” (0.6, 1.8 million) and “Arrow” (0.4, 1.3 million) were even.
NBC easily won the night with a 3.4 and 14.5 million viewers. ABC and Fox tied for second in the demo with a 1.3. ABC was third in total viewers with 5.1 million. Fox was fourth in total viewers with 4 million. CBS was fourth in the demo with a 1.0 but second in total viewers with 5.2 million. The CW averaged a 0.5 and 1.5 million viewers.
