Evening News Ratings: Week of June 3

By A.J. Katz 

ABC News World News Tonight with David Muir finished the week of June 3 as the No. 1 evening newscast in total viewers (8.3 million) and No. 1 among the ad-friendly Adults 25-54 demo.

With an assist from multiple 2019 NBA Finals broadcasts in prime time, World News Tonight beat its NBC rival by +1.3 million total viewers and +162,000 A25-54 demo viewers. In fact, winning for the 36th time in the 37 weeks of the season, ABC’s evening newscast scored its largest margin of victory over NBC Nightly News among total viewers in more than 22 years – since May 26, 1997. In addition, WNT delivered its largest demo audience since the week of June 4, which happened to be 2018 NBA Finals week.

Despite all of the accolades for ABC, NBC Nightly News with Lester Holt remains the No. 1 evening newscast among adults 25-54 this broadcast season to-date.

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Sports had a significant impact on last week’s evening news ratings. NBC removed Monday and Thursday due to Games 4 and 5 of the Stanley Cup finals. ABC removed Wednesday and Thursday due to Games 3 and 4 of the NBA finals. NBC’s evening news ratings average is based on three days, and is the case for ABC. CBS Evening News is based on all 5 days.

Versus the comparable week in 2018, ABC was flat in total viewers, NBC was -3% in total viewers, while the CBS Evening News (anchored by CBS News correspondent David Begnaud) was -5%. In the A25-54 demo, ABC was -7%, NBC -5% and CBS -15% vs. the comparable week last year.

Begnaud continues to anchor the CBS Evening News this week.

Additionally, Nightly News is debuting a new series, My Big Idea, tonight featuring NBC News correspondent Harry Smith interviewing top democratic candidates about a single policy idea they are proposing.  The interviews will run through the week leading up to the first Democratic debates, hosted by NBC News/MSNBC/Telemundo on June 26-27.

Numbers for the week of June 3 2019:

ABC NBC CBS
• Total Viewers: 8,297,000 7,069,000 5,312,000
• A25-54: 1,609,000 1,447,000 938,000

 

 

 

Source: The Nielsen Company, NTI Total Viewers, Adults 25-54 and Adults 18-49 Live + SD, 2018-19 Current Week (w/o 5/27/19), and Year-Ago Week (w/o 5/28/18).  Season to date: Most Current: 2018 -2019 Season (9/24/18 – 6/2/19) and 2017-2018 Season (9/25/18 – 6/3/18).  Averages based on regular telecasts. 

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