ITV 1

18.45: Emmerdale - 4.27m (19.2%); inc. +1, 4.42m (19.9%)
19.45: Coronation Street - 5.59m (23.5%); inc. +1, 5.85m (25.6%)

BBC 1

20.45: EastEnders - 5.73m (23.8%)

Ridiculous figures all-round. I can't speak for the other two soaps but that's definitely EastEnders' lowest-rated Christmas Day episode on record.

I didn't watch it live, I was too busy playing with my Bluetooth-controlled BB-8 droid from Star Wars.

I guess tech like that didn't exist in the 1980s...

Shocking figures.

Well these aren't the finals though are they? in two weeks when all the consolidated ratings come in all the shows will probably have added up to a million more. Overnights are pretty meaningless now. People who are busy no longer watch live TV.

And to be fair, there is hardly anything in it. Corrie is infact only a head because plus 1 is added.

Many watched live via iPlayer and VOD.

Not surprised by EastEnders' ratings as it was up against Downton Abbey's final episode. If there was no clash, I'm pretty sure EastEnders would have been the highest soap by quite a margin. But regardless, the ratings for all shows was abysmal - no TV show got more than 7m viewers

Just goes to show that not many people watch live TV anymore. We'll wait and see what the final rating are.

Eastenders was up against the final ever episode of Downton Abbey - of course it's ratings would be down.

Mrs Browns Boys was again the BBCs top rated show - maybe people want a laugh on Xmas day or warm family viewing.

If you ignore all catch up figures, EastEnders is slightly ahead of the other two. If you add on iPlayer and BBC Three repeat, I'd say it beat Corrie and Emmerdale by a fair amount, so your point about watching TV LIVE, is true.

These are dreadful figures, but it's not like it's just the soaps that are rating badly. Mrs Brown's boys only got 6.5 million, they normally get huge numbers on Christmas Day. I guess people really do watch on catch up more these days.

Very low viewing figures. The soaps are dying.

EE should have been split. It's not strong enough atm to be the pinnacle of Christmas Day viewing. Also now DA has gone maybe it can on a bit earlier if indeed it should be on at all next year.

I also think ITV's 2015 campaign in derailing EE's momentum has been successful.

ITV's hostile scheduling of CS and Em has been significant.

Also the BBC and DTC need to take the blame. The story boarding is atrocious. Who is monitoring DTC and his team? Where is the Head of Drama - is it Ben Stephenson? What's he doing?? EE left to its own devices. In the old days you had John Yorke and Mal Young monitoring the EPs.

I think things have changed. People watch TV when they want now and the soaps are on too much. Whittle them down to 2 days. Yes I know they're cheaper than normal drama output. Maybe BBC should focus on comedy and sitcoms.

That would bring the viewers back on festive occasions.

TV ratings are becoming more and more meaningless every year. The way people watch tv has changed, i rarely ever watch tv live anymore. It's better this way, i get to watch tv shows on my own time.

I think EE is just too complicated. For example one minute Vincent is helping Ronnie get rid of Charlie and shagging her, the next minute he is speaking Jamaican and Ronnie is trying to kill him. One minute Roxy is shagging Ronnie's husband, the next minute Ronnie is trying to protect Roxy from a rapist. One minute Cora is advising Abi and Lauren the next minute Cora is homeless and rummaging through bins. Things change really really quickly on EE nowadays.

EE hasn't been closely monitored by BBC Drama for years, that's how Kirkwood got away with driving the show into the ground unchecked.

I don't think anyone at the BBC actually watches EastEnders.

The only soap that should be reduced to 2 episodes a week is Coronation Street. It is so dull at the moment and not much is happening.

Exactly. The legacy Kirkwood left has been intrinsic to EE's downfall.

We may be in Brookside territory now.

I did mean EE in that statement Tue and Thur (even though Mon has been the better rater that would revert back to one of them. Or do 1 hour for EE on those days then it's the same output).

As part of PBS I think the BBC has a different remit to ITV's soap onslaught

Why? because Corrie got a few thousand more viewers thanks to plus 1? Don't be silly.

Come next week when all the officials come back the final ratings might be very different...

And they couldn't do that in recent years?

Do overnights really mean that much now? So many different ways to watch programmes now. Were the soaps the only ones down? I doubt it. Christmas tv was pretty rubbish throughout the day/night

dtc's lying clearly has had no effect. I think possibly he hadn't delivered on viewer targets!

However, I think that the overnight ratings are no longer accurate, have felt this a while but those figures are appalling for a xmad day evendownton lost approx 4m viewers

The BBC's Head of Drama commissioning is now Polly Hill. Ben Stephenson left earlier this year for the US.

I agree - I don't think EastEnders has many champions at the BBC. Charlotte Moore, BBC One controller, has said some complimentary things in the past but nothing that strikes me as suggesting she's passionate about it. Danny Cohen, the former Head of BBC Television and once a BBC One controller, suggested he was an EastEnders fan once - though the fact he presided over the Kirkwood / Newman era and seemed to deny there was any issues with the show suggests otherwise.

BBC 3 got over 500k for EE at 11pm. Strong rating and does help the figures overall

Disturbing was the car-crash Corrie episode beat the professional Call The Midwife! With Corrie having an older viewer base, and it's viewership dying off, that's a show I can see in Brookie territory not EE.

Really shocked at how low-ish they are.

Eastenders was up against Downton so likely lost a few million.

I meant with the story lines