Before I get to this week’s rating’s news, I have to post a correction. Last week I reported that Ryan Seacrest reported 45 million votes during the Top 10 results show Season 5. That was incorrect. In fact, Ryan did not mention any vote totals at all. Here is an updated and corrected vote totals chart:
This week, vote totals are down only 6% from last year. Daylight Savings Time had kicked in the previous Sunday morning last year. This is significant, as the downturn in the ratings has so far been blamed on DST starting three weeks early this year.
Here is an updated Season 6 ratings chart. It includes final Nielsen ratings for American Idol through the Top 10.
Here are this week’s preliminary ratings:
- Fox started the night off with “Idol, ” which averaged 25.6 million viewers and a 9.9 rating/28 share in the adults 18-49 demographic. It easily beat relatively anemic competition at 8 p.m., including “NCIS” (13.7 million, 3.2/9) and “Dateline: NBC” (5.7 million, 1.8/5) plus repeats on ABC and the CW.
- The half-hour result show, which sent rocker girl Gina Clocksen packing, averaged 25.3 million viewers and a 9.5 rating/26 share among adults 18-49, according to preliminary data from Nielsen Media Research.
Season 5’s final Nielsen numbers for Top 9 week had 28.8 million viewers and a 11.6/32 rating for Tuesday, and 26.2 million viewers and a 10.8/26 share for Wednesday.
The preliminary numbers for this week could change once they are final, but for now, that’s an 11% decrease for Tuesday’s show and a 3% decrease for Wednesday.
Those numbers for last year include a Daylight Savings Time dip. So, that particular excuse for lower ratings can be set aside. Mainstream media like Variety, TV Week and TMZ are now acknowledging an actual slide in the ratings this year compared to last.