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NBC Primetime Rio Olympics ratings, viewership 2nd-most dominant for any Olympics after 2 nights

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Mon, Aug 8th 2016 08:55 am

Viewership and ratings for NBC's exclusive coverage of the 2016 Rio Olympics is off to the second-most dominant primetime start of any Olympics on record.

After the first two days, NBC's average primetime viewership (24.4 million viewers) and household rating (13.0) had respective 294 percent and 210 percent advantages over the other broadcast networks combined - the second-largest Olympics advantage on record (behind only the London Olympics).

NBC will begin total audience delivery reports later this week measuring full consumption. The TAD will measure broadcast, cable and digital/other consumption.

Saturday night's NBC coverage (8:30-11:05 p.m. ET/PT) averaged 20.7 million viewers in primetime - topping the other broadcast networks combined by 381 percent to rank as the most dominant Saturday night on record. The telecast posted an 11.4 household rating. Saturday's Olympic coverage on the networks of NBCUniversal was watched by 80.5 million viewers (27.1 percent of the U.S. population) in 46.5 million homes (39.9 percent of U.S. TV households).

The NBC primetime figures do not include simultaneous live coverage on NBCSN, which averaged 1.5 million viewers from 8-11 p.m., and the 705,000 viewers for Bravo's live coverage of Olympic tennis (7-10:40 p.m.), featuring Venus Williams' three-set loss to Kirsten Flipkens.

NBC's 5.9 primetime rating among adults 18-49 on Saturday night topped by 743 percent the other broadcast networks combined (0.7) - the largest advantage on record for any non-Super Bowl night.

In addition, NBC Olympics' cable and digital metrics are on record pace:

Cable

•NBCSN's 2016 Rio Olympics coverage has increased vs. London on all three days of event coverage. Saturday's full-day coverage (9 a.m.-midnight) averaged 1.8 million viewers - up 45 percent from the comparable day in 2012. That increase follows respective 28 percent and 18 percent full-day increases for Wednesday and Thursday soccer coverage.

•U.S. Men's Basketball win over China on NBCSN (6-8 p.m.) averaged 3.8 million viewers - topping viewership of all U.S. men's basketball games on the network at the 2012 London Olympics. NBCSN's Saturday viewership peaked at 4.3 million viewers during the game (6-6:15 p.m.).

•U.S. Women's Soccer win vs. France averaged 2.9 million viewers - up 19 percent from the team's second match in 2012 (vs. Colombia).

Digital/other

Saturday was the best day ever for NBC Olympics digital platforms, with 155 million live streaming minutes (up 263 percent from the comparable day in 2012) and 11.3 million unique users (up 7 percent).

•NBC Olympics' 216 million live streaming minutes through Saturday is the best ever at this point in the Olympics, and up 280 percent from the same point in London 2012.

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