ABC is leading the evening newscast race in total audience, one of the more noteworthy developments of the broadcast season to-date.
World News Tonight with David Muir eeked out another total viewer victory over NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt for its 4th win in the past 5 weeks.
World News Tonight was up compared to the same week last year in total viewers (+1.5 percent), though it fell 2 percent in A25-54. Season to date, World News ranks No. 1 in total audience for the first time in 17 years – since the 1999-2000 season.
NBC Nightly News remains comfortably ahead of ABC and CBS in the key news demo, and grew +.5 percent from the comparable week in 2015. Nightly was down -2 percent in total viewers vs. last year.
The CBS Evening News with Scott Pelley experienced a rough week relative to this time last year, down -6 percent in total viewers and down -3 percent in the news demo. CBS aired another installment of Thursday Night Football, as was the case on the comparable Thursday last year. As a result, CBS Evening News ratings are based on 4 days (Mon., Tue., Wed. and Fri.).
Evening news numbers for the week of Oct. 17:
| Network | ABC | NBC | CBS |
|---|---|---|---|
| • Total Viewers: | 7,987,000 | 7,970,000 | 6,410,000 |
| • A25-54: | 1,703,000 | 1,973,000 | 1,432,000 |