Looking ahead to next week, the third & fourth audition shows in history.

Third Audition Show
2004: 6.8m
2005: 7.8m
2006: 8.7m (40%)
2007: 8.7m (43%)
2008: 8.16m (43.5%)
2009: 11.76m (51.9%)
2010: 10.90m (49.2%)
2011: 10.51m (43.4%) / 11.07m (45.9%)
2012: 8.15m (35%) / 8.57m (36.9%)

Fourth Audition Show
2004: 7.0m
2005: 7.0m
2006: 7.6m (40%)
2007: 8.2m (42%)
2008: 9.02m (42.8%)
2009: 10.26m (51.7%)
2010: 10.94m (45.0%)
2011: 10.30m (37.8%) / 10.77m (39.6%)
2012: 7.7m (33.9%) / 8.21m (36.3%)

I think these may be relevant later in the week.

So far we have:

Auditions 1: 8.78m (40.0%) / 9.20m (41.9%)
Auditions 2: 9.21m (36.2%) / 9.94m (39.1%)

These ratings are really impressive. I feel as though The X Factor is back this year at it's best, and the ratings reflect this. The majority of my college class were talking about the show today, and they seemed to love it. With the younger age group, Tamera and the guy that sang in Spannish are the favourites. I'm obviously not a typical teenager because I'm not a huge fan of either of them

Anyway, back to the ratings. It's the third most watched second audition show in the history of the show, that's amazing. A peak of over 11 million is massive too. I hope the ratings continue to rise, and we end up with a huge overall average at the end of the year. Ratings wise, this series has already beat last series (besides the final) which is fantastic. There's everyone saying The X Factor has had it's day while the show is peaking with over 11 million Love it.

Indeed - no one could expect the show to gain back the viewers it lost the past two series straight away. The huge advertising campaign seemed to have helped, but the idea of having the rooms on Saturday and arenas on Sunday seems to have gotten a bit of a mixed response here but it doesn't matter if they keep rising.

Series 8 & 9 failed to see much of a rise in the live shows compared to the auditions, so they will have to work hard to ensure that the live shows are once again 'event TV', and it'll probably be back at 2008 levels again (for the live shows - some of the live shows fell below that in 2011 but the Sunday results shows saved it from falling below it in series average ).

X Factor's highly unpredicable. Could drop from now, or it could explode and improve by a million or two over the coming weeks - we've seen it happen before. Time will tell.

All they need is ONE contestant every week to create a bit of buzz. As much as I disagree with Tamera going through, shes definitely ticked that box for this week.

Sharon Osbourne is also getting a glowing reception from all corners. On Radio 1 today they were discussing X Factor and how 'fabulous' it is shes back. Particularly they were talking about the room auditions and giving them a good response. Sharon also won This Mornings favourite judge poll by a landslide with 44%. It's much more positive this year and it feels like 2008 again when Cheryl joined. Hopefully the figures will begin to creep up.

An 11.2m peak is particularly impressive for last night, for a bit of perspective, series 5, 6 and 8 all peaked generally around 11/12m too whilst last year generally peaked in single figures except for the final 2 audition shows. The average last nights also beats every show last year except the final, so its definitely a marathon and not a sprint but the signs are promising so far.

Traditionally there is a dip at the boot camp stages but because of the changes this year, I think it may hold up better than previous years.

I'm not keen on people (well, a certain someone) trying to downplay its success/growth.

Solid rating for xf yesterday. But Hassan and others - why do you think yesterdays share for XFactor dropped compared to Saturday? If the buzz was good, would you have not expected share to actually go up above 40pct?

More people watching TV on Sunday, a couple more million compared to Saturday.

I think it would have needed 10m to crack 40% on the Sunday, but I think that'll be achievable in the coming weeks.

Still, you cannot take anything away from those figures. They've reversed the decline and I don't think ITV would have asked for more.

They can create more buzz in a week rather than in a day, in my opinion.

Wow 11m is brilliant. I thought Sunday would be a little more than Saturday's ep, but still around 9+m nowhere over 10.

Now the show has started it'll generate it's own hype, press

Thanks to Score.

5-Minute Breakdown (Saturday - inc +1)
20:00 - 7.61
20:05 - 8.61
20:10 - 8.81
20:15 - 7.82
20:20 - 9.45
20:25 - 9.36
20:30 - 8.41
20:35 - 9.97
20:40 - 10.10
20:45 - 9.85
20:50 - 8.84
20:55 - 10.06
21:00 - 10.28
21:05 - 8.98
21:10 - 9.56
21:15 - 9.49

Nice growth in the first hour, but viewers seemed to tail off a bit after 9pm. Think it bodes well for the following weeks, though.

Predictions for tonight?

I think it's be most definitely up on last week, probably a touch over 9m without +1. But you never know, with people being back at work/school etc, more people would have known about it. It would be nice to see it above 10m but it's been a while since either BGT or XF saw a 1.2m week-on-week increase during the audition shows.

This weeks thread was a lot quieter than last week - I think it may be down by a bit.

Social Media reactions were far down compared to last week, as was the activity of this forum. I hate to say it but I think ratings aren't going to be that impressive

@TVRatingsUK: The X Factor last night averaged 8.3m including +1, down on last week's opening audience of 9.2m.


Ans strictly got 8.4 million with a peak of 9.4 million whereas X factor received a peak of just 9.1 million!


It's such a shame as last weeks show was fantastic, and this weeks show had some great talent too.

With +1 included, it averaged 8.3m (38%), peaking with 9.5m (9.1m without +1).

Disappointing but between the first weekend and the second, there usually is a bit of a drop.

The Sunday show wasn't received very well last week so I'm not sure if we'll see much of a rise tonight.

But, hopefully this is just a blip and that it continues to rise. It needs a bit of time to build up that loyal audience again.

Awful and unjustified

We can only assume that the 10-minute clash with Strictly harmed it a bit.

I don't see how people can watch strictly

Hope they are back up tonight

I can't comprehend the hype for Strictly. I'm open minded when it comes to any talent show, but Strictly is just awful, how is it competing with X Factor?

2013: X Factor - 0 Strictly - 1

I agree,

Many people just don't want to watch X Factor now because of its stereotype of joke acts etc

Strictly is popular with old people. X Factor was beating the hell out of Strictly in 2009, and it was still comprehensively beating it in 2010. 2011 is when it all changed - and Strictly ended up beating XF by a couple million.

I think people may have been put off by the fact there were a couple of returnees last night, though they showed a lot of talent.

There usually isn't a big rise between the Saturday & Sunday shows so I predict something in the 8m range.

X Factor only faces the lottery next week, and for a couple of weeks after that. I think it's better that for now, Strictly avoids X Factor completely, rather than it being the other way round so that X Factor ends up starting any later than 8pm.

Yes, I don't think people liked the fact they showed so many returnees in one go.
Also the fact that not much, if any, good groups or boys or overs were shown - this seems to be the Girl Factor so far

Simple. Strictly is more fun, it doesn't take itself too seriously. It's not about life or death (neither is the X Factor, but the way they hype it you'd think it was), there's none of the blatant nastiness from the judges that we've come to see on XF in recent years.

For me SCD has a much nicer feel and vibe. And I'm not old either, I'm tired of that excuse being trotted out year in year out. Strictly is as much of a family show as the X Factor is. It's sour grapes IMO.

The joke acts are the big problem after last years fiasco with Rylan which turned a lot of people off. It needs to concentrate more on the proper music acts.

It's pointless. X factor is finding a star, strictly is (paying?) celebrities to take part, most of which not many people know :yawn:

I agree it can be entertaining though, but so can the X Factor

Finding a star? You mean like Matt Cardle and Joe McElderry? And whatever did happen to Steve Brookstein

The rot set in with the X Factor when they started to believe the hype.