For the 14th consecutive week, ABC’s Good Morning America and NBC’s Today split the weekly morning show ratings race. GMA averaged its largest average total audience (3.25 million viewers), while Today captured the most adults 25-54 (882,000) of any morning show for the week of Nov. 1, 2021.
This is according to Nielsen live-plus-same-day for the seventh week of the 2021-’22 TV season.
GMA out-performed rival Today by an average of +184,000 total viewers per original broadcast last week, which is triple the margin from the previous week. Despite extending its margin of victory from the prior week (Oct. 25), GMA did shed -2% in average total viewers. However, it also gained +4% among adults 25-54 from the prior week.
Year-over-year, GMA was down by -16% of its average total audience and -26% in the A25-54 demo. To be fair, the comparable week in 2020 was the week of the 2020 presidential election, a time when far more Americans are focused on morning TV than usual.
NBC’s Today finished the week No. 1 among adults 25-54, which means the program has earned either an outright win or first-place tie in the key A25-54 demo for 318 out of the past 323 weeks. Quite a run!
In addition to averaging 882,000 adults 25-54 (+62,000 than GMA and +373,000 than CBS Mornings) last week, Today averaged 3.07 million total viewers.
After multiple weeks of audience growth consecutive week, NBC’s morning show saw decline across multiple audience measurements. Today shed -6% in average total viewers and gained -7% among adults 25-54 from the previous week, one which included a highly-rated Halloween-themed broadcast on Friday. Additionally, Today shed -17% in average total viewers and -25% among adults 25-54 from the comparable week in 2020.
CBS Mornings averaged 2.44 million total viewers to go with 509,000 A25-54 viewers last week. That’s -4% in average total viewers and -3% adults 25-54 from the previous week. The broadcast shed -22% of its average total audience and -33% of its A25-54 audience from the same week in 2020, a steeper decline than that of its competitors.
Live-plus-same-day numbers for the week of Nov. 1, 2021:
| ABC | NBC | CBS | |
|---|---|---|---|
| • Total Viewers: | 3,250,000 | 3,066,000 | 2,438,000 |
| • A25-54: | 820,000 | 882,000 | 509,000 |
Source: The Nielsen Company, NTI Total Viewers, Adults 25-54. Live + SD Current Week (w/o 11/1/21), Previous Week (w/o 10/25/21) and Year-Ago Week (w/o 11/2/20). Most Current: 2021 -2022 Season (9/20 – 11/7/21) and 2020 -2021 Season (9/21 – 11/8/20). Beginning 8/31/20, national ratings also include Out of Home (OOH) viewing. Averages based on regular telecasts.