The 2019 NRL grand final featuring the Sydney Roosters and the Canberra Raiders on Channel 9 had the lowest national grand final numbers this decade with 2.641 million viewers across metro and regional audiences.
The five-city metro audience included Sydney 832k, Melbourne 320k, Brisbane 534k, Adelaide 87k and Perth 93k totalling 1.866 million which is the lowest since 2003.
It is a drop off from last year’s NRL grand final featuring the Melbourne Storm and Sydney Roosters, which was watched by an average of 3.03 million people nationally and 2.141 million viewers in capital cities, including 895k in Sydney, 551k in Melbourne, and 488k in Brisbane. This continues a trend of declining TV audiences for NRL grand finals since the 2016 grand final between Cronulla and Melbourne.
In comparison, Last weekend’s AFL grand final had a 26 year low with a national audience of 2.939 million viewers on Seven.
Brocken down into metro markets:
