Nope. The only iplayer views that get counted are if they are watched directly via the tv , which makes up a small number overall. The vast majority of iplayer views are NOT included in Doctor Who ratings.

Is Doctor Who quite unique in that it has so many timeshifted viewers?

Can anybody explain why this may be?
It fascinates me why this appears to happen with Doctor Who as opposed to other TV shows.

well there are a limited number of shows that have hit 2 million time shifted viewers (Broadchurch is a recent example), and increasingly shows are all timeshifting more than a few short years ago.

Broadly it's because of the ease of watching shows whenever we want to now compared to in the past, as for why Doctor Who leads the way with it, probably due to the audience demographic being more technologically savvy.

But as time passes, we will likely continue to see more and more diverse ways in which people watch tv programmes and thus overnight viewing figures will decline overall year by year for all tv.

With exemption for News, Sports, and other big live events.

Honestly I think fandumb on the Internet is the biggest enemy the show has right now. There's no... for lack of a better term no joy in it with endless over-reactions to anything that's perceived as less than perfect, a complete lack of understanding as to the status of the show amongst the non-hardcore fan and endless paranoia about anything that's seen as changing the slightest aspect of the series. Hell this is a fandom that sees gaining popularity abroad as a BAD thing!

Anyway, as far as ratings are concerned 7.45 for Rings is pretty damn good and it's looking like Cold War will timeshift over 7 as well. Considering the 8 and a bit for Bells and with the return of Gaiman later in the year (and the subject matter of that episode which I'm carefully not mentioning ) it's looking like S7 will fall in that traditional 7.5 - 8 million average for the series quite nicely. Considering what the iPlayer figures are on top of that Who is still performing quite remarkably for a show now in its eighth year. And that, ultimately, is all that matters!

... For a show in its 50th year, even!

7.45m... It had a late final burst then, and nearly got to 7.5m!

Just shows the public still love the show!

Asylum of the Daleks 8.33m
Dinosaurs on a Spaceship 7.57m
A Town Called Mercy 8.42m
The Power of Three 7.67m
The Angels Take Manhattan 7.82m
The Bells of Saint John 8.44m
The Rings of Akhaten 7.45m



7.95 million - Series 1 average
7.71 million - Series 2 average
7.55 million - Series 3 average
8.05 million - Series 4 average
7.73 million - Series 5 average
7.52 million - Series 6 average
7.95million - Series 7 average after 7 episodes.

Thus far the most consistent series to date ratings wise I think. Might not be as thrilling as some of the rollarcoaster rides of recent years, but it is rather nice

Likely that Cold War will be in the 7.7m region (+/- a little either way), so that should keep the average above 7.9m with 5 episodes to go

Two things...

1) it's audience is probably fairly young and so used more to recording and watching later.

2)it's position at early on a sat evening often means that people are still busy out, or doing things so can't watch as its shown.

1) the audience for Doctor Who is spread fairly evenly across all age groups, but under 24's still do make up by far a minority of it's audience (though high for the average drama) Just as an example, here is a break down from The God Complex:

4 -15: 19%
16 - 24: 9%
25- 34: 13%
35- 43: 18%
45 - 54: 18%
55 - 64: 12%
65+: 11%

So I'd suggest it's less about age and more about being technically savvy, as per my post above

2) When series 7a) aired at around 7:30pm in September there was an expectation that the over nights would increase and the time shifts would be smaller. Didn't really happen. The only episode that had a noticeable boost to overnights was A Town Called Mercy, which was down to being on after the strictly come dancing launch show rather than the timeslot itself.

Damn you, Journey's End! *shakes fist*

Perhaps part of this is also people like me who would rather record it and watch it quietly rather than with people yapping all the way through!

I also watch it later at night when it's on at silly times like 6pm If that's not possible, I'll wait for another day.

Cold War is currently at 6.548m

That's an increase of 860k from the Live figures

That's down on the ~1million that watched rings of akhaten on the sunday - so it'll probably be level with rings in the finals or slightly lower.

Also - Doctor Who is behind the voice on iplayer for the first time since either of the shows launched three weeks ago.

Thanks Yog, another strong timeshift. Do you know where Britain's Got Talent and The Voice are up to as well?

BGT is up to 9.666m (+1: 10.974m)
The Voice sits at 7.472m

It's worth remembering that this is the current figure for the full slot average (ie 6pm-6.45pm). The episode actually started at about 6.03pm, and it's likely that Cold War will benefit by a good 0.1m or 0.2m when the adjustment for the actual transmission time is made.

Thanks. The Voice has added 0.8m already then. BGT not up that much yet but the major adjustment there will be when the time adjusted figures with the ads stripped out are in.

Another 7.5m+ on the cards I reckon.

No surprise as The Voice clashed with BGT. People catching up.

Sadly these type of 'live event' shows seem to be more popular now then Drama series.

What surprises me more is that You've Been Framed! And Famous 4 was on at the same time as Doctor Who and that got 4 million viewers. Obviously Doctor Who easily beat it but even so, 4 million people would apparently rather watch that than Doctor Who? I don't get it. Perhaps I'm just a TV snob.

I don't think it is. A few years ago somebody on that Gallifrey forum did a demographic breakdown of the viewers each week and the vast majority of viewers were over 16.
Compared to most other shows yes, it has a high number of viewers of the very young demographic, but I think most viewers were over 25 or 30.

Thanks Muttley, I posted my post above before I came to this post.

Maybe more people than I thought own smart TVs nowadays too.