"Nightline" Is No. 1 for 10th Straight Week in All Target Demos

By Joanne Amato June 7, 2012

Season to Date Nightline Ranks No. 1 in Latenight for Second Straight Season

ABC's "Nightline" ranked No. 1 for the week of May 28, 2012, taking the top spot in latenight for the 10th straight week in all target demos: Total Viewers (3.588 million), Adults 25-54 (1.287 million) and Adults 18-49 (1.055 million), according to Nielsen Media Research. "Nightline" has stood as latenight's top program of the week in all 3 measures in 13 of the last 14 weeks.

Furthermore, "Nightline" has taken the No. 1 position in 26 weeks in Total Viewers, 30 weeks in Adults 25-54 and 29 weeks in Adults 18-49 of the 36 weeks of the season to date.

Season to date, "Nightline" ranks No. 1 in latenight among Total Viewers, Adults 25-54 and Adults 18-49, ahead of both NBC's "The Tonight Show" and CBS' "The Late Show." This marks the 2nd straight season that the ABC program is taking the top spot in all 3 Nielsen measures.

During the week of May 28, Nightline took a closer look at an alarming medical condition linked to substance abuse known as "excited delirium" and new rules in New York City regulating soda sales and featured exclusive interviews with Queen Elizabeth's family ahead of the Diamond Jubilee celebrations.

ABC News' "Nightline" is anchored by Cynthia McFadden, Terry Moran and Bill Weir. Juju Chang is a correspondent. Jeanmarie Condon is the Executive Producer. The program airs weeknights from 11:35 p.m., ET to 12:00 a.m. on the ABC Television Network. Together with "Jimmy Kimmel Live," "Nightline" is part of ABC's winning latenight strategy of airing news and entertainment programming.

Note: Due to the Memorial Day holiday, ABC's, CBS' and NBC's Monday telecasts were coded as specials and excluded from the weekly average. In addition, due to the NHL Stanley Cup Finals Game 1 on Wednesday (5/30), "The Tonight Show" was retitled "The Tonight Show-JL" and was excluded from the average.

PROGRAM AVERAGES	TOTAL VIEWERS	A25-54(000)/ Rtg	A18-49(000)/ Rtg
ABC "Nightline"	3,588,000	1,287,000/ 1.1	1,055,000/ 0.8
CBS "Late Show"	2,589,000	1,047,000/ 0.9	799,000/ 0.6
NBC "Tonight Show"	2,996,000	1,074,000/ 0.9	827,000/ 0.6

Source: The Nielsen Company, NTI Total Viewers and Adults 25-54 Live + SD weeks of 5/28/12, 5/21/12 & 5/30/11. Most Current: 2011-2012 Season (9/19/11 - 6/3/12) and 2010-2011 Season (9/20/10 - 6/05/11).