Pulling a dramatic upset of the #2 seed in night two of her farewell tour, Serena Williams delivered another big audience for ESPN.
Primetime coverage of the US Open averaged 2.27 million viewers on ESPN Wednesday night, including 3.6 million for the Williams-Anna Kontaveit second round match — up 289% from the equivalent day last year and the largest opening week US Open audience since ESPN began airing the event in 2009.
The full telecast, which peaked at 5.0 million in the final quarter-hour of Williams’ match, delivered the ninth-largest US Open audience ever on ESPN.
Williams’ match specifically outpaced all-but-one US Open final since ESPN acquired exclusive rights to the tournament in 2015, trailing only her 2019 loss to Bianca Andreescu (4.0M).
Daytime coverage averaged 703,000 viewers, up 43% from last year, bringing the full day average to 1.4 million (+167%).
The US Open is now averaging 922,000 viewers through the first three days, up 80% from last year, with Williams’ swan song the driving force. Barring any scheduling changes, she will have headlined four of the first five nights of the tournament as of Friday night, with three of those windows airing on the ESPN flagship. Her scheduled Friday match against Ajla Tomljanovich was flexed from ESPN2 to ESPN, bumping a scheduled Western Michigan-Michigan State college football game.
Though Williams has been the dominant draw, viewership jumped even without her on the schedule Tuesday night — if not as sharply. ESPN’s primetime coverage averaged 1.07 million viewers on Tuesday, up more than 50 percent from last year.
(Nielsen estimates from ESPN, ShowBuzz Daily 9.1)
