George getting a little confused, there. (That's what happens when you watch too much ITV1) It doesn't need snow for Andy Murray to be playing a big Wimbledon match at 6.30pm on a weekday. Wimbledon tend to schedule him third on court to suit the BBC.

My point was BBC1 would be torn at 6.30 between the biggest ratings show - regional snow or Murray playing tennis? Lets face it, the onlt time BBC1 is interested in the "regions" - those annoying people who write letters to POV - is when there is some freak weather event for BBC "News" presenters to stand in?

So anyway no real ratings yet? For things like TVB,TMO, ASM&M?

I can see Popstar to Operastar being axed at the end of its run. Opera and ITV1 aren't a good mix to start with.
Still can't see how BB can affect Coronation St as BB is mostly watched by people under 35 and most of Coronation St's audience is older. Unless the first Corrie episode was boring and people dropped out of the second. Still think these two episodes a night are a mistake as the second episode seems to attract fewer viewers.

Ah, get you now.


I think we had a debate on this a few pages back. It would seem that Corrie is a lot more popular with the under 35s that some people might think.

The loss of viewers to the CBB final provides some evidence of that.

Programme for that race was 4.4m (50%) [pre-race: 3.1m (41%); race: 5.1m (54%); red-flag: 4.8m (51%)] last April. The graphical breakdown for the F1 that day looked like - http://img79.imageshack.us/img79/386/sun5thapr09.jpg . I suspect it'll be a very similar story tomorrow.... but a little lower.

I'm guessing at ~3.5/4m this morning. Federer was 2-0 up at one point, some casuals may have tuned out... on the other hand, people may have had it on as background noise, as with the F1 example above.

My mother watches Corrie and BB (and opted for the final on Friday). And she's definitely over 35.

Looking at the data on C4 Sales, about 60% of the BB audience are over 35.

do you know how much of corries audience is over 35?

Rubbish. In the nineties apart from the regional news there was no regional programming on BBC1, the only regular regional shows were the regional political shows which went out on Sunday lunchtime BBC2 in a slot that changed virtually every week and nobody watched because we already had On The Record and Walden and nobody wanted anymore, and the regional documentaries like First Sight and Close Up North which went out on Thursdays at 7.30 on BBC2 and nobody watched them either because they were opposite EastEnders.

Now, all regional programming is on BBC1 and that includes the regional political shows which may be shorter but are in a much better, regular slot, and mixed in with the national stuff so more people watch them. And, as we all know full well, regional stuff on BBC1 is not low rating. It gets massive audiences.


I do know this, but only because I've got the Radio Times where people wrote in about it. It was in January 1983, on a Wednesday night, and actually unbilled in the Radio Times, it was a last minute decision. As you say, it ended at the tea break and people wrote into Radio Times to ask why, and a Beeb suit replied that it was very expensive and, given England were miles behind, they didn't think it was worth carrying on.


Yes, they've certainly had the rights for at least a decade although mostly it's only been in highlights form - I remember taping a week's worth of afternoon highlights for a flatmate in 1998. They've shown the men's final live every year, though, but they also used to show the women's final live as well, even though it was at 5am, which they didn't this year.

Actually a quick skim through the Radio Times from 1994 shows that in that year it was actually live on Sky and the Beeb didn't show any. I dunno when Sky gave up on it.

Sat 30.1.2010

Harry Hill 6.6m / 28.6%
Take Me Out 4.6m / 19.7%
All Star Mr and Mrs 4.8m / 19.8%

Day After Tomorrow 2.6m / 11.6% includes +1

QI 2m / 9.6%
Heroes 850,000 / 4.4%

Total Wipeout 4.6m / 23.5%
SYTYCD 4.6m / 20.7%
SYTYCD Res 4.7m / 20.0%
Casualty 5.6m / 23.6%

Thanks a lot dubsj . What did In It To Win It get?

Excellent start to the series for Harry Hill, especially as there was no big hitter around it (i.e. X Factor) to help inflate its rating. I expected Take Me Out to rise compared to last week due to the better lead-in which didn't happen, but the share is its best yet. The slightly earlier start helped out Mr and Mrs.

Total Wipeout did well, taking the early slot into account. But it was poor scheduling from the BBC. It should be starting after 6pm at least, especially last night when they could've done that but instead they put a Live at The Apollo repeat on later! Oh dear, So You Think You Can Dance is plumetting. It remained around 5-6m in the last few weeks but that was against poor competition. <5m is quite bad, and obviously the show hasn't connected that well with the public as it's nearly 2m down from what it was getting near the start of the series. I also think Casualty is lower than it should be... I would've expected it to be hitting 6m+/25%+ at this time of the year. It's quite a sharp decline compared to Jan 2009.

Thanks for the figures dubsj. Terrific rating for Harry Hill's return and top rated show of the day it would appear. The poorer than expected ratings for the review show were obviously nothing to worry about. Overall, ITV held up really well last night against the BBC which had quite a poor Saturday night bar Casualty.

Elsewhere, The Day After Tomorrow performed very well for Ch4 considering that film has been shown numerous times now on free-to-air television.

In It To Win It 5.9m / 25.3%

Thanks a lot dubsj. Brilliant start for TV burp, and proof that it can draw in the big numbers on it's own without big shows around it. It seemed to dent SYTYCD a lot, which like rzt says, isn't connecting at all. On 2nd January, SYTYCD launched with 6.4m, almost double the 3.6m that Take Me Out launched with. Last night, they got the same rating. Says it all really.

The numerous repeats have clearly dented Total Wipeout as that isn't a brilliant start to the series (by it's own standards, it's still very strong for that slot). Mr and Mrs did alright, and wasn't far behind Casualty. Do you have anything for Ice Age and You've Been Framed?

Ouch. Another light entertainment flop for BBC1.

Thanks dubsj

So, SYTYCD over a million down on last week. It does appear that there were a lot of viewers watching it because of the much weaker competition on ITV1. 4.6m isn't a disaster, but it's heavily down from the beginning and normally these shows tend to build their audience.

Also 5.6m for Casualty in January? By no means is that poor, but down quite a bit on last year.

ITV have had a much better January on Saturdays this year despite no big hitters. Harry Hill returned to the same audience he was at when XF followed...those people who said the ~7m ratings he was getting were just because of XF have been proven wrong and number one show of the day is fantastic. Glad it performed well because it was a top quality episode and I really hope he doesn't go to SKY.

I'd be extremely surprised if TMO didn't get a recomission now, Solid ~4.5m ratings for the past 4 episodes is good, but not only that but I reckon it is capturing the young audience that stays in on a Saturday night. So many facebook statuses last night were ''no likey, no lighty'' and over 100,000 have joined the FB group. I would have confidence in putting this show after the XF in the Autumn where I can see it pulling in ~6m ratings.

Well pointed out!

Just realised that!

ITV know they have a hit when their shows start to rise, it doesn't tend to happen that often!

Did anybody really expect SYTYCD to be a major hit though? I know I didn't and going by the scheduling I don't think the BBC did either.

Its ratings so far mirror quite closely how The One and Only performed in early 2008, breaking the 6m barrier on launch before falling to around or just below 5m during the middle of its run, but it recovered a bit towards the end and finished on a high note. We'll have to see if SYTYCD can do the same.

Exactly right Dan. I think the fact they only gave it one audition show speaks volumes for how much faith they had in it. Nearly every year they bring out another singing or dancing talent show that does alrite but nothing spectacular. SYTTCD was probably the best chance of having another big hit on their hands with it being a big show in America but it hasnt been handled right. The next couple of weeks will see whether it sinks or swims.

I was expecting around 5.5m. But I think the launch ratings raised expectations. Clearly it hasn't been able to sustain that audience and 4.6m isn't too good. Interesting to see what it gets next week, I thought at 5.5m it was a good bet for a return next year but anything lower than this weeks ratings and it may not be back.

Next week SYTYCD moves to 7.05pm but its lead-in is half an hour of Six-Nations post-match analysis, which could send viewers flocking to YBF!.

Talking of which, any figures for last night. I expect it too beat SYTYCD, which quite clearly benefited in the early weeks from a lack of competition from ITV1. Poor figures last night, but probably what it deserves.

As people have pointed out, SYTYCD is not a big ratings hit in the States, but survives because it has a large young-audience. Is it on Fox over there? I imagine that's more of a young person's channel than BBC1.

FOX is the youngest channel in the US with a median age of 42 for the fall season in 2009 (one year younger than 2008). NBC is 48 (+3), ABC is 51 (+1) and CBS is 53 (+1). So You Think You Can Dance? is one of the youngest skewing shows on FOX with strong ratings among women 18-34.

However, this data was posted on another forum about SYTYCD shows that isn't happening here at all (this info doesn't include this weekends ratings):

Blimey! Must be the Arlene Philips Fan Club tuning in.

Those figures are quite shocking. Suggest that next year the BBC hold the auditions at the country's Tea Dances and have done with it. Actually, if they turned it into a dance competiton for the over 50s only, that might prove to be a ratings success. I'm sure that age group would feature better personalities than the young ones on the programme. Just so long as the ladies don't wear the same type of costumes as the young females have been (not) wearing this year.

Thanks for that. At least I didnt dream it, but shows just how far tv has changed when it was such an unknown to have that kind of coverage.