I'm going to be a bit over optmistic and say anything between 9.5m and 11m.

This will be the TV event of the year easily in my opinion....

11.5 million

Thank god Dancc only has a birthday once a year - looks what happens when he leaves us for a few hours. We end up talking about the soon to be axed low rated flop that is Doctor Who with those sane rational folk out of the DW threads!


The Outnumbered repeats would surely have made more sense in the post-Casualty slot. I don't know why but I always get the feeling the BBC doesn't love that show as much as it should.

And how anyone thought Celeb Masterchef repeats at 6.10pm on a Saturday was a good idea I don't know.


Merlin manages it, Waterloo Road, I guess Casualty/Holby and Shameless churns out the episodes too - plus most dramas in most other countries manage it too. Really we are generally short changed with our 6-8 part drama series and we should be getting 13 episodes as the minimal standard - but that is a whole other topic.

Doctor Who ratings are disappointing, it would seem that Matt Smiths Doctor just doesnt enjoy the publics love that David Tennant did. That said speaking as a fan, I dont have any major problem with him, ok there has been a couple of dud single episodes this season, but the past two have been excellent and really good Sci-Fi, whilst the arc episodes are always brilliant

I truly will be surprised if Downton is below 10 million. And with the BBC's schedule now being uniform this will be a marker as to how the Autumn will pan out-certainly how AR will fare against XF. Last week maybe Countryfile and Gently impacted a touch on XF.

No Dancc, that means no undying love for Channel 5 then and BB. Actually he's gone off to write a conspiracy theory where BARB and Channel 4 have under recorded its ratings so it can be taken off.
Seriously, though, he is trying to big up a station which is better than many people realise.

Interesting stat that i picked up from the ratings thread over at Gallifrey Base.


This could account for the low overnights.

As soon as Channel 5 lost the feed for the boxing they probably knew they would be in trouble. The fact that Fury won so quickly that they could air the fight again for those who missed it did not help matters. Saying that, Big Brother should be capable of at least 1m+ even if it did start in the middle of The Million Pound Drop and just before Match of the Day. I think Channel 5 need to do air a live twist just to lure viewers back. Friday's figures were decent; they need to get closer to them more often.

Doctor Who was left high and dry in a horrific schedule of daytime cooking shows (which maybe shouldn't daytime but...), lazy quiz programmes and a hospital show that's core audience is around the 4.5m mark. Saying that BBC One didn't flop on the night; the ratings were reasonable for each show and Match of the Day did very well. Doctor Who will timeshift but it'd be nice to see them treating it a bit better than airing it in broad daylight during the spring, then in the middle of a weak schedule in the autumn.

Like BBC One, I'm not sure what Channel 4 are trying to achieve by airing a bunch of filler before 9pm which results in The Million Pound Drop being left high and dry. It's a decent figure considering it had a lead in of under 1m. On the issue of Come Dine With Me; they may as well air it 24/7 and kill it off completely.

It was an excellent night for ITV1. The lure of Family Fortunes is that most of the family can just about bear it as a timewaster if need be; sci fi shows do not have the same allure. The X Factor is not losing any momentum despite the new panel but they need to put the right people through to the live shows; I think people may be tiring of the joke acts. Jonathan Ross bounced back well but I wish they'd use that lead in for repeats of Thursday's Celebrity Juice to try and boost its audience further, then the ITV News (or The Only Way Is Essex if they want to drive the knife into Big Brother ) and then the late night film. Splitting the film around the news is ridiculous.

Dad's Army seems slightly down on previous weeks but that could be down to the lead out. QI XL and The Other Boleyn Girl drew in an audience not drawn in by soap, sport or light entertainment. It may have been better to air Strictly Ballroom in a couple of Saturday's time before Strictly Come Dancing started on BBC One.

I'm going to say this bluntly.

It is only for Doctor Who that timeshift seems to be important or is "bigged up".

If other shows can still maintain huge overnights, (The Body Farm for instance, up against Doc Martin and is a brand new show, gained more overnights on a Monday than Doctor Who did against poor competition on Prime Time Saturday), then Doctor Who, a well established show that is supposedly the Jewel in the BBC's crown should be achieving higher overnights.

I am perfectly happy to concede that timeshift figures make up the overall figure, but my argument remains that if fewer people are watching Doctor Who as it is broadcast, then eventually more people will choose not to bother watching it at all in a few years' time.

I'm no fortune teller, but one does wonder what the viewing figures would be like if Tennant was still in the role. He maintained a healthy 6-8 million viewers in virtually all his episodes, and that was overnights. iPlayer was also in existence in 2008 as was PVR and Sky+. The difference was people genuinely wanted to watch the show as it went out. Now they don't. Perhaps it's because they feel they have many options or perhaps they feel it no longer matters whether they watch or not. That is seriously something that needs considering.

How do we think the departure of James Bolam will affect New Tricks ?

The Body Farm was on on Tuesday against ratings flop 71 Degrees North. The Queen's Palaces was on against Doc Martin and got considerably less than Dr Who (3.9m)

Yes, thanks for correcting me! Even so, Family Fortunes is a filler and DW should have got more viewers.

Pretty poor evening for BBC1, with the exception of Casualty, everything is about half a million lower than I expected. The scheduling for MasterChef is evidently now very poor. I'm not sure if that hurt Doctor Who, but that too had a lower overnight, however it will timeshift to 7 million, so that'll be fine. What people don't realise about Who is the timeshift being so much higher than any other programme, so the overnights is not the full story.

Pretty good night for BBC Two apart from the hour versus The X Factor. I think we'll see tonight if X Factor makes any significant increases on the previous auditions - last year's last Sunday audition had 11.6m (42.8%) so it should be heading for that ballpark again. Very good ratings for Family Fortunes, I doubt ITV imagined them beating Doctor Who in the overnights, while Jonathan Ross bounced back from last week's poor rating.

Channel 4 had an alright night, while Big Brother appeared to have collapsed again on Channel 5. I think we could well see another below 1 million rating again against Spooks and Downton Abbey. I'm looking forward to seeing the ratings for those two in the morning, I'm really intrigued to see how Downton Abbey rates. I know it's facing Spooks, but something's telling me that it could actually bring in its highest figure ever. It wouldn't surprise me at all.

I agree they need new shows but more than that they desperately need to ditch their rinse and repeat Saturday schedule. There's really very little variation in terms of content on the BBC1 Saturday night schedule across the week. Honestly I think dropping the lottery draws (and the quiz shows that anchor to it) and dramatically reducing the number of Casualty episodes per year could be the best thing to happen to BBC1's Saturday night schedule. It might force them to be a bit more creative and adventurous.


For the record that stat is one of the reasons Doctor Who is so important to BBC1. I think people get very hung up on how many people are watching shows on BBC1 (and the BBC in general) when just as often who those people are can be as important if not more so.


In fairness that's because Doctor Who's timeshift does seem to be uniquely large.


Again I say its not always about how many people are watching but who those people are.


Potentially I agree but I think more information needs to be gathered as to why people are happy to timeshift rather than watch live. There are more potential reasons for timeshifting and iPlayer viewing other than the show not being 'must see'.


Tennant's last full series was broadcast 3 (or is it 4?) years ago now and over the last 3 (4?) years the television landscape has changed quite a lot. The iPlayer has grown substantially since Tennant left the role as has the use of PVR's - just ask Sky how much the use of Sky+ has grown over the past 3 (4?) years I'm sure they'll be more than happy to tell you.

In general I think Tennant gets far too much credit for the ratings whilst he was The Doctor if only because (as far as I can remember) he's never really been able to transfer this apparently huge popularity into blockbuster ratings for anything other than Doctor Who.

Sky running ads for Glee during X Factor - will be fascinating to see how it performs next week.

Thanks rzt, the matches outside the home nations really aren't doing good business . These figures must be well down on Australia 03, even if the matches were a little later in the day.

yes I cant work out what has gone wrong for Tennant since Doctor Who, he is in serious need of a new agent. This forthcoming Postman Pat movie, is going to be dreadful, why his agent even mentioned it to him, is beyond me.

And that's a fine theory if we work under the assumption that people are watching Family Fortunes rather than Doctor Who but its not entirely clear that's the case.

The timeshift argument is one reason I think Downton Abbey will be high - it is highly anticipated and I don't think people will want to be left behind by taping it when it crops up in conversation tomorrow.

Look forward though to all the Doctor Who fans branding Downton a flop tomorrow should it only rate around the 8m mark.

I think it will pick up. Drama avoiders, kids etc. Think Xtra Factor is probably a bigger threat than the two big drama's.

I dont know, alot is expected of Downtown Abbey, some will say anything less than 9 million is a flop.

Personally I would think 8 million on the low side, anything less would be a flop.


That said who cares about Downton Abbey when Spooks is on in 23 minutes? (at time of post)

Interesting you say that: I was just looking at last year's figures for Downton Abbey and it timeshifted a lot last year. Last year its overnight series average (which includes STV) was 8.7m while the official series average (which doesn't include STV as they opted out) was 9.7m. So it timeshifted +1.0m viewers, but that was after the STV audience was taken away from the officials (about -8%). Basically, it was essentially timeshifting about +1.8m viewers last year! With STV on board this series, I can see timeshifts being really high for DA generally. I do agree though, that for the season premiere itself, its timeshift might be lower than normal.

Because Doctor Who gets the highest timeshifts on TV. How many other shows have got timeshifts of 2m or regularly get timeshifts of 1.5m+? You also have to take into account the proportion of DW's official rating comes through timeshifting. Where as for a Doc Martin or New Tricks its 1m added on to 8m, Doctor Who's timeshift is 1.6-1.8m added on to just 5-6m. Its a big difference.


That is a good point and a worry, I would prefer as many watched on the night as possible, however the lower overnights havent yet corresponded with any lower official ratings or total reach, the opposite has happened.


Again your putting more importance on overnight viewers. Why? It doesnt matter how they watch, just that they have watched. I would say that a viewers who makes the effort to go on the internet to watch an episode via iPlayer or look through their planner to watch an episode is more commited to the show than the large amount of casual viewers who are counted in the overnights who just have the show on because they have nothing better to do or just because they ahd BBC1 on.

iPlayer was around for series 4, the figures are far lower than they are now, around 0.5m per episode compared to 1.5m per episode now.

Your making out less people are watching when they are not. The last two series have been the most watched since the 2005 revival. The fact is viewer's habits are changing and watching TV live on the night is becoming a thing of the past, viewers are deciding when they want to watch a show and Doctor Who's audience are far ahead of the general trend.

One of the reasons I think they should consider moving Doctor Who to a Sunday evening slot. Kids in particularly will be much more insistent watching it live if they know they can go to school tomorrow and talk about it with their friends. Plus I really miss that family Sunday serial slot.


Indeed.

Better late than never, its the two graphs! http://img692.imageshack.us/img692/9017/graphsu.png