The Kentucky Derby continues to prove itself as one of the marquee television events of the spring season.
NBC’s broadcast of the Kentucky Derby averaged 17.7 million viewers on Saturday, marking the most-watched edition of the event since 1989 (18.5 million viewers), and a 6% increase over last year’s audience (16.7 million viewers for Mystik Dan’s photo finish). It is the largest audience NBC has ever drawn for the race since its partnership with Churchill Downs began in 2001.
It should be noted, the average audience is based on viewership from 6:33 to 7:24 p.m. ET, also known as the “race portion” of the broadcast. Data for NBC’s full broadcast, which began at 2:30 p.m. ET, is not yet available.
Viewership peaked at 21.8 million viewers in the 7 p.m. ET quarter-hour for Sovereignty’s 1 and 1/2-length victory, up 8% from last year’s peak audience (20.1 million viewers).
Peacock chipped in a record-setting streaming audience, averaging 959,000 viewers for the race window, up 34% from last year’s streaming audience (714,000 viewers).
As with many of the recent record-high audiences in live sports, like the Super Bowl in February, Nielsen’s updated out-of-home methodology certainly helped lift the broadcast to new highs. All things being equal, several other Kentucky Derbys — many of which cracked 16 million viewers without the addition of out-of-home viewing — would’ve likely measured higher than this year’s.
Nevertheless, the Kentucky Derby remains one of the most-watched non-football sporting events of the year. Per Jon Lewis of Sports Media Watch, only Game 5 of last year’s Dodgers-Yankees World Series (18.15 million viewers) and last month’s Florida-Houston NCAA men’s basketball national championship (18.1 million viewers) attracted more viewers in the past year than Saturday’s race when excluding football and the Olympics.
In today’s era of diminished television viewing, the Derby has been a remarkably stable property for NBC, who was keen to capitalize on the audience with some cross-promotion.
The network was also dealt a curveball early in the day when host Mike Tirico was forced to bow out due to an allergic reaction and was replaced by Ahmed Fareed.
About Drew Lerner
Drew Lerner is a staff writer for Awful Announcing and an aspiring cable subscriber. He previously covered sports media for Sports Media Watch. Future beat writer for the Oasis reunion tour.