Week 13 TV: Married at First Sight’s biggest week in Nine’s best-ever Q1

Married at First Sight

TV audiences turned to news bulletins too during the east coast rain event

Nine with Married at First Sight has cruised to another TV ratings victory with the same winning primary share it had a week ago. Nine’s winning network share moved marginally, down 0.1 to 30.3%. The win in the final week of survey before a two week Easter break was driven again by the biggest week of Married at First Sight so far this year.

TV audiences turned to news bulletins too during the east coast rain event this week with higher average audiences for the commercial and ABC news bulletins week-on-week.

Nine still Married to success

For the first time this year every night of Married at First Sight had an average audience over 1m. The show recorded its biggest audience of the week on Sunday with 1.118m watching the newlyweds negotiating the early weeks of their relationships.

A Current Affair was down 15,000 week-on-week with an average of 662,000.

60 Minutes was just under 600,000 and Under Investigation was just over 500,000.

Nine yesterday had a few technical challenges to start the TV ratings break. But it was also able to report its highest-ever first-quarter lead over its nearest competitor with the key demographics of People 25-54 and 16-39.

Hamish Turner, Nine’s program director, said: “The powerful combination of the Australian Open, Married at First Sight and a diverse news offering has driven Nine to a dominant position in Q1. Across both the 9Network’s linear channels and 9Now, we have seen Married again capture the national conversation in a way no other Australian TV show does. Married will continue its momentum as we move into Easter and beyond with a strong slate of family favourites like Lego Masters, Ninja Warrior, Celebrity Apprentice, Beauty & The Geek and The Block that will continue to deliver throughout the year.”

Michael Stephenson, Nine’s chief sales officer, said: “2021 has seen a phenomenal start to the TV ratings years for Nine. Again, Married at First Sight has been a cross-platform juggernaut, delivering across linear TV and 9Now with all key demographics. We know we have a trusted and proven content slate and will carry that momentum into Q2 with the MAFS vowel renewals, Lego Masters and Celebrity Apprentice. As ever, Nine is the clear market leader across total television – be it linear TV or digital.”

Survey year to date, Nine dominates live streaming with tennis and MAFS, taking out 9 of the top 10 spots against commercial FTA competitors. In catch-up programming Nine was also a clear leader with MAFS way out in front.

Seven

Seven’s 6pm news bulletins were all up week-on-week. The high was Sunday pushing above 1m while Saturday just made it over 700,000.

The channel’s next best was the doco Inside Chernobyl on 567,000.

The only other offerings over 500,000 were the Thursday and Friday night AFL matches and Home and Away on 529,000, up from 519,000 the week prior.

The second part of the doco Ivan Milat’s Buried Secrets was on 490,000 after launching with 480,000.

10

The channel’s shares hardly moved week-on-week.

The highest-rated program was The Amazing Race Monday on 532,000. The Sunday and Tuesday episodes did 493,000 and 506,000.

The Cube dropped to 310,000 on Wednesday while Gogglebox was a ratings highlight on Thursday with 509,000.

The Sunday Project pulled a big audience of 435,000, better than the 7pm weekday average of 403,000. Both numbers were up significantly week-on-week.

Good news from 10 is that so far in Q1 2021, it has three of the top five shows in catch-up viewing – The Amazing Race Australia, The Bold and the Beautiful and Oprah with Meghan and Harry.

ABC

Four Corners with its Parliament House security guard interview was the most-watched ABC show of the week and it raked in the top 20 for the week all channels with 709,000.

The News and 7.30 rated well with both averaging over 600,000 for the week.

Hard Quiz was next best on 635,000, up modestly on the previous week’s 622,000.

Also over 600,000 were Death in Paradise and Media Watch.

SBS

Trains led the way again with a repeat of Great Australian Railway Journeys on 243,000. It was well ahead of the next best, Australian in Colour, on 192,000.

See also: TV Week 12: MAFS commitment – Nine makes it six consecutive weekly wins

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