The Royle Family did brilliantly considering there wasn't as much promotion this year for it.

it will be interesting to see how weverything comes in the offficials. i think EastEnders may be close to 12m in the end

ITV actually held up very well this year. Corrie and especially Emmerdale were up on last year. Shocked by Come Fly With Me's rating though. It'll be interesting to see what Upstairs Downstairs gets tonight.

Shocked at Come Fly With Me. Very clever characters but boring.:sleep: I don't think we as a family raised a smile for the whole half an hour. I can see a big drop for the next episode.

I cant see what all the excitement is about. Its only about the 10th highest ratings day of the year.

Given the weather (although I believe several million BBC viewers are still stuck in snowdrifts and about to be devoured by hungry wolves according to Robbie), and the other factors in this involuntary lock in, you'd expect 10m as a bare minimum for the nations baysittter/ mad relative sitter.

I think we need 2 sets of ratings for the day: those who voluntarily watched and those who watched under duress or under the influence of alcohol.

The BBC line up is increasingly lazy and living on this notion that it IS Christmas personified. They just bung the same stuff on at the same time every year and hope the fools still lap it up

Me, I dont watch much tv on Christmas Day bar Poirot and some multichannel stuff early in the day. Poirot was great but of course its too intense for the available audience of the day and really needed to be recorded for later viewing when all of the people you spend the rest of the year avoiding have gone.

I think ITV1 know they can never beat BBC One on Christmas Day, unless something like Ken Barlow being written out of Coronation St was to happen( maybe something to think about as he's well into his seventies). However, they do have two reliable bankers on Christmas Day and are happy to show filler like You've Been Framed against the big shows on BBC One.
However, Poirot was a bit of an expensive gamble for Christmas Day. I am sure this would have fared far better on New Year's Eve, where a lot of younger viewers go out and Poirot could have done better/

Yes he was and proved how totally insane it would be to give him the job. Its like he is on the west end stage 24 hours a day with a forced enthusiasm which will drive so many people away.
There is a post in the SCD threads suggesting the NOTW is saying Vernon Kay will be given the job-not sure if that is the case as i cant get into the NOTW site and havent got the paper. But he is only contracted a year at ITV and his shows arent doing brilliantly there. Not everyones cup of tea but better than JB.

I think only Bill Roache will decide when that is-I get the impression he will stay as long as is humanly possible.

Jeez, glad I don't have to spend Christmas round at yours you old misery guts!

The investment in Orient Express was a good one for ITV - they got a well-made and decently-rated travel documentary out of it.

A great day for BBC1. Come Fly With Me did extremely well, though I had a feeling it would as it was heavily promoted for the past few weeks.

EastEnders topped the day, though that doesn't surprise me. It picks up a lot more casual viewers than the other two soaps and BBC1 is the 'default' channel for the day. Still, a very strong performance.

Emmerdale and Doctor Who both did very well. Despite clashing with one another, they still picked up a big sized audience without the clash denting each other. Over 7m for Emmerdale is fantastic - it's had a great year and that rating is the icing on the cake. To be up by 2m on the equivalent episode last year deserves some recognition. It was good scheduling there, as it's obvious that Emmerdale and Doctor Who both appeal to different types of audiences.

Coronation Street's 9m is a bit low, but it was up against Strictly and both Corrie and Strictly appeal to the same type of audience I imagine, so I wouldn't be surprised if Strictly dented it and Corrie's official figure comes in at around 10m.

Hope everyone on here had a wonderful Christmas

Thanks this brilliantly full and timely list rzt.

The BBC will be very pleased winning almost all of the day(just needing a few more people to turn up at church and something better than the tired Starsky film). Very surprised at Come Fly With Me managing to increase audience after TRF. The first scenes of CFWM werent attention grabbing imo. The One Ronnie was good imo and great results for Dr Who SCD and EE. TRF deserved a few more but I reckon the subject matter of the script (silent farts and all) which is the same every year is arguably not everyones cup of tea on Christmas Day.
Emmerdale and C/S held up well though Im sure it has not escaped everyones attention that they have been pulling in good figures lately thus providing more of an impetus.
Good results for terrestrial tv.

I hope everyone had a great Christmas. I didn't have time to log in yesterday.

Great Christmas Eve for BBC One and ITV1, and a corking Christmas Day for BBC One. Impressive to see more viewers turning up for the 6pm and 7pm battles between BBC One and ITV1, and impressive for EastEnders to rate higher than it did for Archie Mitchell's bumping off!

The Royle Family hitting its regular 10m, near enough, so that's good news, too. I'm sure it got around 10m at Christmas 2000, so no drop in ten years!

Personally, I loved The One Ronnie: a breath of fresh air, bringing back happy childhood memories of The Two Ronnies.

Not sure about Come Fly With Me. It had its moments, but surely it's soon going to become as repetitive as the shows it spoofs...

Very solid performance by BBC One across all slots. Only real weak links were The Gruffalo which was a repeat and Starsky and Hutch which started too early. I think they should have scheduled something classic in the 10:30pm hour if they couldn't afford to put anything new there as clearly the audience was still there.

ITV1 held up better than normal at Christmas, possibly deservedly so with a stronger schedule than normal. I was a little surprised that Coronation Street didn't quite beat Strictly based on its recent form, but not at all surprised that it was beaten convincingly by EastEnders as always happens on Dec 25.

C4 and C5 struggled as expected for much of the day only occasionally hitting the 1m mark, but BBC Two performed quite strongly at times especially with its classic repeats providing a good alternative. It'll be interesting to see if C5 gets a similar boost with its classic programming this evening.

ITV have never been overly bothered about a bad Christmas day, though compared to shockers like the worst ITV Christmas ever( 1993) and the seventies when they knew nothing could beat Morecambe and Wise, they didn't perform that badly and did the best they could against EE, TRF and DW. However, at least they have one guaranteed banker on a Christmas Day when in some years in the past they would just roll over and die.
Yet the BBC didn't always have things their own way in the past. After ITV bought Morecambe and Wise in 1978, they managed a successful fight back in 1978 with the Morecambe and Wise Show, which pulled in 20 million viewers, and trailed it with a Bond premiere, which attracted 12 million viewers against the big hitters on BBC1. Also in 1987 Hilda Ogden leaving Coronation St was the most watched programme of Christmas Day, pulling in 25 million viewers.

For me the highlights of Christmas Day were The Royle Family ("She's in the dyson!" ) and Doctor Who. Both were absolutely fantastic, tremendously festive. Doctor Who was as fantastic as ever and the best Christmas special I have seen. The Royle Family was hilarious with plenty of laugh out loud moments and perfect pathos.

Really pleased they did well. Come Fly With Me was funny in parts but overall nothing great, it's a shame it beat The Royles - if we were basing it on quality, the Royles would have come out on top.

ITV held up well with the soaps, Emmerdale's rating cannot be laughed at, to be at the 7m mark at 6pm against Doctor Who when in previous years it's been sub-5m is a great achievement. C Street performed quite well too, 9m is a pretty decent figure for Christmas Day ITV.

EastEnders won the day, didn't see the episode (we were watching Corrie on record before The Royles) but understand it was pretty mad. There's a tradition around EastEnders at Christmas, they will always plan a humungous drama fest for Christmas Day and people expect it even if they don't watch all year. Strictly did well.

Poirot at 4.2m is not too bad actually for two hours. I was expecting in the low 3m range, so it held up pretty well - obviously comparitively terrible though.

All in all, some decent figures across the board. Would have preferred The Royle Family to have won the day as it was so excellent.

Didn't Emmerdale get 4.4 million last year or something like that?

Very disappointed that CFWM did better than The Royle Family, it certainly didn't deserve to.

And I'm totally unsurprised that C4's frankly bizarre idea of Xmas programming flopped. What were they thinking with One Born At Christmas?!

I'm not surprised EE topped last year's rating for Archie's murder. Stacey is their most popular character for years; with Lacey Turner achieving the same level of popularity Martine McCutcheon did.

Emnerdale, I think, achieved 4.5 million last Christmas, possibly peaking at 5 million. It has always been the third soap since the old Crossroads was pensioned off and has never achieved the huge following that EE and Coronation St have.

Have to say she will he a big loss to the soap. Five years, countless photoshoots and awards later she has done a tremendous job for EE. It will miss her.

Strictly's final consolidated ratings have been released (thanks to MattJ):

19:00 - 13.72m (46.2%)
21:05 - 14.28m (48.1%)

Best ever ratings for it.

Wow, a clean sweep for BBC One in the afternoon and evening. Two big surprises in there for me:

1. Strictly beating Corrie. I know its happened before but I expected Corrie's momentum to take it to victory this year. I suppose I underestimated the momentum on Strictly's side too though.
2. That Come Fly With Me rating. To increase on the Royle Family lead-in is incredible and I never expected that. Reception has been mixed to put it kindly though, but the next slot is also a cushy one - post-EastEnders on NYD. Credit to BBC One for actually launching something big on Christmas Day. They've been criticised on this thread in the past for not doing so.

Aside from that, great for Doctor Who and EE - right up there with expectations - I was expecting falls for both considering the hype that surrounded their particular stories last year. The Royles have wound up fourth for the night because of the strength elsewhere in the schedules, but they're still something of a Christmas fixture these days - and I imagine that'll continue.

ITV1 did relatively well with the soaps and ASFF did better than I expected against EE. It was something of a surprise to see Murder on the Orient Express drop from that lead-in overall. I thought it might capture a million more. Then again, I suppose committing to a 2 hour drama like that is tough by 9pm on Christmas Day.

Those really are stunning for the show. The BBC and producers should get a lot of credit for the way they've revived a struggling flagship show.

Broadcast has reported yesterday's peaktime shares (6-10.30pm). Here's a comparison to the past few Christmas Days:

Year... BBC1.... ITV1
2007... 45.2%... 24.2%
2008... 43.7%... 21.6%
2009... 39.5%... 20.1%
2010... 39.2%... 23.4%

Also, Channel 4 won a slot yesterday!:


Emmerdale Christmas Day overnight ratings in the past few years have been:

2010: 7.2m
2009: 5.1m
2008: 4.8m
2007: 5.8m
2006: 7.2m
2005: 6.0m
2004: 7.5m
2003: 8.3m

So it was their joint best Christmas Day rating since 2004 - possible their best in the officials as timeshift is more these days.

Maybe Poirot should have aired on New Years Eve when the film version of Orient did so well for BBC1 in 1979? After all, most of the younger viewers are out, meaning there is less competition against Poirot, and I'm sure a New Year's Eve showing would have pulled in 6 million.
Good though it might be, I think a two hour drama like this is unsuited to a Christmas Day in the same way a heavy going epic like Waterloo was too much to take in during the seventies.

much better than expected for Come Fly With Me