It avoided a record-low, but Thursday Night Football still took a hit from one of the NFL’s worst primetime matchups ever.
FOX and NFL Network earned a combined a 6.8 rating and 11.1 million viewers for the Week 9 Raiders-49ers Thursday Night Football game, down 14% in ratings and 16% in viewership from the sixth TNF simulcast last season (Week 10 Seahawks-Cardinals: 7.9, 13.1M) and down 16% and 17% respectively from the sixth simulcast in 2016 (Week 11 Saints-Panthers: 8.1, 13.3M).
Versus last year’s Week 9 TNF game, Bills-Jets exclusively on NFL Network, ratings and viewership increased 89 percent from a 3.6 and 5.8 million.
Ratings and viewership were the fourth-lowest ever for a primetime NFL game on broadcast television, ahead of Broncos-Colts on TNF last season (6.5, 10.64M), Seahawks-Buccaneers on Sunday Night Football in 2008 (6.3, 10.01M) and Broncos-Cardinals on TNF two weeks ago (5.6, 9.10M).
This year’s Thursday Night Football slate has already delivered three of the ten lowest primetime NFL ratings on broadcast TV — and that is with five more simulcasts to go.
The 49ers blew out the Raiders in a matchup of teams with a combined .133 winning percentage — the worst for a primetime game at this point of the season since at least 1970, per an Associated Press writer’s analysis of Pro-Football-Reference data.
TNF scored a 3.2 rating in adults 18-49 (-20%), a 2.3 in adults 18-34 (-23%) and a 4.0 in adults 25-54 (-17%).
It is worth noting that Thursday’s numbers still compare favorably to just about anything else on television, though that goes without saying when it comes to the NFL. For the night, TNF earned a smaller audience than “The Big Bang Theory” (12.64M) and “Young Sheldon” (11.07M) on CBS, but cruised to first place in each of the key young adult demographics.
Lowest Primetime NFL Ratings, Viewership, on Broadcast TV
| Lowest Rated | Least-Watched | ||||||||
| # | Year | Game | Rtg | Net | # | Year | Game | Vwrs | Net |
| 1 | 2018 | DEN-ARIZ | 5.6 | FOX* | 1 | 2018 | DEN-ARIZ | 9.10M | FOX* |
| 2 | 2008 | SEA-TB | 6.3 | NBC | 2 | 2008 | SEA-TB | 10.01M | NBC |
| 3 | 2017 | DEN-IND | 6.5 | NBC* | 3 | 2017 | DEN-IND | 10.64M | NBC* |
| 4 | 2018 | OAK-SF | 6.8 | FOX* | 4 | 2018 | OAK-SF | 11.06M | FOX* |
| 5 | 2017 | MIA-BAL | 7.0 | CBS* | 5 | 2007 | NO-SEA | 11.19M | NBC |
| 6 | 2007 | NO-SEA | 7.1 | NBC | 6 | 2017 | MIA-BAL | 11.36M | CBS* |
| 7 | 2016 | SF-AZ | 7.4 | CBS* | 7 | 2004 | TB-STL | 11.48M | ABC |
| T9 | 2018 | MIA-HOU | 7.5 | FOX* | 8 | 2001 | TEN-OAK | 11.71M | ABC |
| 2014 | TB-ATL | 7.5 | CBS* | 9 | 2014 | TB-ATL | 11.88M | CBS* | |
| 2001 | TEN-OAK | 7.5 | ABC | 10 | 2005 | BAL-GB | 12.05M | ABC | |
* Asterisk indicates game was simulcast on NFL Network.
[Numbers from Nielsen via Programming Insider 11.2, with additional info from Josh Dubow/Twitter 10.28]
