Week 8 of the NFL season brought a number of viewership increases and multi-year highs, Cowboys-Eagles being a noted exception.
Sunday’s NFL national window (mostly Saints-Bears) averaged a 12.0 rating and 22.77 million viewers on FOX, marking the league’s largest Week 8 audience since 2015 (Seahawks-Cowboys: 29.39M; Packers-Broncos: 23.01M). Ratings were flat and viewership increased 8% from last year’s comparable Week 8 window on CBS (mostly Browns-Patriots: 21.03M).
FOX averaged 17.78 million viewers for its doubleheader (+6%), with the early window (mostly Vikings-Packers) scoring a 6.8 rating (-7%) and 12.31 million (+2%).
Over on CBS, coverage featuring Steelers-Ravens in nearly half of the country averaged a 10.1 and 18.65 million — the network’s most-watched singleheader in any week of the season since Week 14 in 2016 (19.10M). Ratings increased 1% and viewership 7% from Week 8 on FOX last season (mostly Eagles-Bills or Panthers-49ers: 10.0, 17.41M).
The NFL on CBS has averaged 16.27 million viewers over the past four weeks, up 12% from last year and the network’s best average in Weeks 5-8 since 2015 (19.18M).
Also on the upswing was ESPN’s Monday Night Football, which scored its largest Week 8 audience in five years for Buccaneers-Giants (11.70M, +17%). The Buccaneers’ narrow win averaged a 20.8 rating in Tampa-St. Petersburg, the market’s highest MNF rating since the series moved to ESPN and a higher rating than any Rays or Lightning game in those teams’ respective playoff runs.
MNF is now averaging 11.22 million viewers this season, off just 1% from last year (11.30M).
The Thursday and Sunday night games were exceptions to the rule. As previously noted, Falcons-Panthers was down double-digits on TNF. On NBC’s Sunday Night Football, Cowboys-Eagles averaged a 9.5 and 16.93 million (17.5M including streaming) — down 9% in ratings and 8% in viewership from Packers-Chiefs opposite the World Series last year (10.4, 18.32M).
The matchup of sub-500 teams was the least-watched Cowboys game on primetime broadcast television in three years — since a 2017 Thursday Night Football matchup against Washington on NBC (15.60M). The TV audience was also the team’s smallest on SNF since 2007, also against the Eagles (16.45M).
SNF has now averaged a single-digit rating in five straight weeks, the longest such streak since 2007.
The full list of 2020 NFL ratings is available here.
[Nielsen estimates from ShowBuzz Daily 11.3 a, b; CBS Sports PR, Fox Sports PR, ESPN PR 11.3, NBC Sports PR/Twitter 11.3]
