NBC's Ratings For Rio Olympics Down Sharply From London Games of 2012

Sorry to do another post about entertainment news. But I do hate NBC so.

The primetime coverage of the Rio Summer Olympics continues to trend way down from the 2012 London games. The first night of competition on NBC on Saturday garnered 20.7 million viewers from 8:30-11:05 PM ET/PT. That was down 28% from the comparable night of the Olympics in London (28.7 million from 8:30-11:28 PM), which had ranked as the most-watched Summer Games opening night on record. Last night’s average edged Day 1 of the Athens games in 2004 for the second-smallest audience since 1992 (see chart below).

The good news -- sort of -- for NBC is that online viewing is way up.

Saturday was the best day ever for NBC Olympics digital platforms, with 155 million live streaming minutes, the network said. That was up 263% from the comparable day in 2012. The number of unique users was up slightly to 11.3 million (7%).

Not sure you get anything like the advertising dollars for online viewing, though.

One thing might drive up viewership as the Olympics continue, though: Simone Biles, and the rest of the women's gymnastics team, which could wind-up being an All-Time squad. (Could be a 1-2 battle between between Biles and Ally Riesman in individual all-around.)

Biles explosive power in jumps (and high-rev turns in flight) are pretty amazing, but what seems even more remarkable to me is that she just sticks to the ground like Spiderman after jumps that really seem like you'd need a bounce or two to halt your momentum.

posted by Ace at 04:39 PM

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