"World News Tonight with David Muir" is Having Most-Watched Season in 11 Years

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ABC News’  “World News Tonight with David Muir” averaged 9.026 million Total Viewers, 2.047 million Adults 25-54 and 1.443 million Adults 18-49 for the week of February  15, 2016, based on Live +Same Day Data from Nielsen Media Research.

Season to date, “World News Tonight” is improving versus the same point last season in Total Viewers (8.862 million vs. 8.833 million).  Growing for the 4th straight year, “World News Tonight” is delivering its largest overall viewer audience in 11 years – since the 2004-05 season.

In addition, “World News Tonight” is narrowing its Total Viewer season margin with “NBC Nightly News” by more than half (-54% - 268,000 vs. 578,000), posting its closest overall viewer performance with the NBC program in 8 years – since the 2007-08 season.

For the 2nd week in a row, “World News Tonight” ranked No. 1 on Friday (2/19/15), beating “NBC Nightly News,” in both Total Viewers (+249,000 – 8.095 million vs. 7.846 million) and Adults 25-54 (+60,000 – 1.855 million vs. 1.795 million).  In fact, “World News Tonight” has ranked No. 1 on Friday for the last 4 weeks and in 6 of the last 7. 

In addition, the ABC evening newscast ranked No. 1 on Thursday in Total Viewers, beating the NBC program by 164,000 (8.851 million vs. 8.687 million).

“World News Tonight” decreased its week-to-week margins with “NBC Nightly News” in all key target demos: Total Viewers (-82% - 33,000 vs. 187,000), Adults 25-54 (-28% - 130,000 vs. 181,000) and Adults 18-49 (-56% - 96,000 vs. 216,000).  The ABC evening newscast turned in its closest performance in 7 weeks in both key adult demos – since w/o 12/28/15.

“World News Tonight” slashed its year-to-year Total Viewer margin “NBC Nightly News” (-92% - 33,000 vs. 416,000).

For the week, “World News Tonight” outperformed the “CBS Evening News” by 1.700 million Total Viewers, by 323,000 Adults 25-54 and by 295,000 Adults 18-49, posting its largest news demo margin in nearly 3 months – since w/o 11/23/15.

NOTE: Due to CBS’ telecast of “The Grammy Awards” on Monday (2/15/15), “CBS Evening News” was specialed and retitled to “CBS Evening News Special.”  The telecast was excluded from the weekly averages.  CBS’ weekly averages are based on 4 days (Tue-Fri).

ABC “World News Tonight with David Muir” airs 6:30–7:00 p.m. EST on the ABC Television Network.  Almin Karamehmedovic is the executive producer of the broadcast.  

Source: The Nielsen Company, NTI Total Viewers, Adults 25-54 and Adults 18-49 Live + SD weeks of 2/15/16, 2/8/16 and 2/16/15.  Most Current: 2015-2016 Season (9/21/15 – 2/21/16) and 2014-2015 Season (9/22/14 – 2/22/15).  Averages based on regular telecasts.   

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