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The Handmaid’s Tale is big on Timeshifted numbers

More than half the audience for SBS drama are watching in their own binge-viewing sessions.

More than half the audience for SBS drama The Handmaid’s Tale has not watched it Overnight on SBS, but in their own binge-viewing sessions.

While SBS attracts numbers of around 250,000 in Thursday night broadcasts, figures climb to over 600,000 in 28 Day Consolidated viewing.

Those figures, based on 5 city metro averages, are also without SBS On Demand and regional audiences. They speak to why the show has been a hit for the broadcaster and one that has ruffled the feathers of commercial networks who cite it as being ‘off-Charter.’ Nine / Fairfax-owned Stan is understood to have wanted the title, and it’s not hard to see why.

Here are numbers for recent select episodes:

May 3:
236,000 (Overnight)
307,000 (Timeshifted to 28 Days)
543,000 (28 Day Consolidated total)

May 31:
278,000 (Overnight)
338,000 (Timeshifted to 28 Days)
617,000 (28 Day Consolidated total)

June 7:
242,000 (Overnight)
340,000 (Timeshifted to 28 Days)
582,000 (28 Day Consolidated total)

7 Responses

  1. Hey David,

    With Handmaid’s Tale attracting more views online than on-air, and other shows going the same way (Love Island) do you think more credit and importance will be given to online views? I may be wrong but it’s always felt to me that broadcast views matter more than online, which is odd as online gives much more accurate metrics (total viewers, duration viewed, sometimes gender etc. if they are signed in) and they can’t fast forward commercials. Would love your insight on this please David 🙂

  2. Holy shit, those are huge numbers for SBS. Can other networks finally take this as a reason to put American programming on same day as US? It’s getting embarrassing how behind the times they are

  3. This just shows you how we are watching drama these days. My husband and I are binge viewing it and we are still have three episodes to go. Appreciate the ‘spoiler alerts’ David in some articles that I have avoided (you are totally aware of your fan bases viewing habits).

    1. You’re a braver woman than me, I couldn’t binge watch THT, too unrelenting! So good though that we have the option to watch it at our own leisure, I wait til my baby is in bed at night, not the best childrens viewing ?.

      1. Oh don’t worry….we have had breaks. We initially watched the first two episodes of season 1 around the time season 2 commenced. We stopped not thinking we would return, but were convinced otherwise to pursue…we do have breaks and my husband cannot watch two episodes a night! Last night I tried to convince him to watch episode 11 S2 on the back of 10, but the football seemed to interesting in his opinion and I lost him to Geelong and (I think it was) Melbourne??

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