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News Breakfast beats Sunrise, viewers drift from primetime Reality.

ABC still on a ride with the election fallout. Two primetime reality shows struggling in overnight numbers.

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The wash-up from the election continues to be big business for ABC.

News Breakfast has claimed a rare victory over Sunrise yesterday, winning its slot at 138,000 / 85,000 viewers -a total of 223,000.

That pushed it ahead of Sunrise on 221,000 for the second time in its history, with Today in third place at 192,000.

But the good news for ABC didn’t end there, with many viewers shunning new Reality TV offerings in primetime.

7:30 also led its slot at a big 723,000 metro viewers ahead of Australian Story (630,000), MasterChef Australia (523,000), Celebrity Apprentice (367,000) and Big Brother (343,000) -however the latter is doing decent business with younger viewers in BVOD.

Have You Been Paying Attention? was the top entertainment drawcard and led the demos at 645,000 then Media Watch (528,000), Four Corners and (526,000).

Seven network still won the night with 26.3% then Nine 24.15, 10 21.3%, ABC 21.1% and SBS 7.3%.

Seven News was #1 at 1.07m / 1.02m then The Chase 602,000 / 355,000 and Home & Away (558,000). 9-1-1 was 183,000 / 137,000.

Nine News (917,000 / 888,000) was best for Nine then A Current Affair (674,000) and Hot Seat (480,000 / 305,000). Million Dollar Murders drew 202,000 with Nine News Late at 155,000.

The Project pulled 418,000 / 297,000 for 10. 10 News First was 342,000 / 231,000.  FBI: Most Wanted was 223,000.

ABC News won its slot at 739,000. Language and Me (269,000) and The Drum (239,000) were also up for ABC.

On SBS it was SBS World News (148,000 / 116,000), 24 Hours in Emergency (123,000), Saving Lives at Sea (109,000), Ten Mistakes (83,000) and Mastermind (73,000).

With waning interest in Reality TV offers, many Seven viewers switched to 7TWO’s Doc Martin, very high at 175,000.

Updated: SBS Worldwatch share is 0.0% according to OzTAM.

In Total TV numbers last Monday were:

9-1-1: 504,000
Big Brother: 849,000
Lego Masters winner ann: 1.27m
Have You Been Paying Attention?: 1.15m
MasterChef Australia: 877,000
Australian Story: 813,000

OzTAM Overnights: Monday 23 May 2022

12 Responses

  1. Dear David, with apologies if I have missed it and I did try and find for myself, but has OzTam calculated who won last week. Back of the envelope calculations suggest seven but wasn’t sure. If so, by my account, incl the Olympics weeks, it is 7/6 in favour of Nine (I think). Thank you.

  3. Let’s hope we see more News Breakfast wins.

    BBAU continues to be awful. Even housemates on Twitter are complaining about the shoddy editing – and not in the usual way where they’re trying to save face.

  4. I would not be promoting the death of reality television as yet (especially with Married at First Sight still pulling close to a million viewers earlier in the year) but it does show that screening three of them against each other generally cannibalises the audience and the networks might do better with more varied offerings than showing the same program up to five nights per week across the bulk of their primetime schedule.

    Like the UK the audience for terrestial television is dropping rapidly and markedly.

    The question though is what do they replace their reality/competition shows with? The networks will argue that drama and comedy are too expensive, that any kind of Tonight show style entertainment is old fashioned, etc. They appear to have boxed themselves into the reality mould and if it keeps failing they simply cannot go anywhere else. After all, there is little programming that produces so many hours so cheaply.

    2. I know what you’re referring too, I’ve also noticed the drop off of people watching reality shows live, MAFS being the notable exception. Some shows seem to do very well with catch-up, Big Brother being a good example, but I too have started to wonder if reality TV is starting to become too much for the average Australian viewer and yes putting a reality show up against two other reality shows probably is cannibalizing the audience.

      I’ve cut right back on my reality TV viewing. That’s partly because there’s too much content each season but also because it’s the same sort of thing, with the same kind of people, time and time again. I’ve become kind of bored with it. At the same time streaming keeps putting up new ideas which i’m really enjoying.

  5. This may bode well for the FTA showing of Five Bedrooms. I hope so. I don’t watch it but any drama series getting viewers is great for our actors.

  6. Doc Martin is a show that would do well in the older demographics. Which goes to show that the market for older people shouldn’t be ignored. They might not be tuning into BB. I liked HYBPA? last night. The highlight for me was the Keith Urban joke about no one being able to name any of his songs with the only title mentioned as “Nightways” that no one could prove correct due to not knowing, that became a running joke. I looked it up and it’s not even a song of his, which made it even more hilarious. To be fair on Keith, I do know “The Fighter” ft. Carrie Underwood because it got some airplay on mainstream radio some years ago.

    1. i totally agree the older demographic should not be ignored. According to the stats around 16% of the population are over 65. And they are much more likely to be watching fta TV than younger people who tend to watch streaming TV, play video games, & use social media alot more for their entertainment. Lots of retirees out there who have plenty of $ to spend too, so advertising that reaches that audience is still worthwhile.

      1. It isn’t the fact that they don’t have money, but that they don’t spend it on fast moving consumer goods and gimmicks, and they can be reached cheaper through the internet, radio, newspapers and magazines which they consume. As for serving this market, the ABC, Gem, 72, Bold SBS and many Foxtel channels have large over 55 audiences.

    2. You do realize that most of the ch72 stuff is ex ABC and very well repeated there over the years-older viewers are pretty certain to have already seen it, and ad free at that.

      1. I still watch…except when they cut Antiques Roadshow in half…
        Having said that….most of my actual live TV viewing is 2nd screen…
        9 is the only network I am not signed onto…no reason to do so up to now.

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