There were only three Olympic events across the first six days of the TV ratings week, but the audience turned out in force for two football matches and then the Tokyo Opening Ceremony in huge numbers.
That gave Seven the best shares for any network and primary channel so far this year. The numbers indicate that the lockdowns in several Australian states might be helping the ratings.
Seven Olympic hosts Hamish McLachlan and Abbey Gelmi
TV ratings: Seven 28.4% primary share, 39.5% network share
Seven really controlled the week from start to finish. Seven ranked #1 in TV ratings network shares on every night of the week and it was the #1 primary channel on six of the seven nights.
Leading the ratings charge for Seven was Seven News again winning its timeslot across all seven days.
Home and Away lifted with its mid-season finale cliffhanger on Thursday night helping increase the average audience to 664,000 after 605,000 the previous week.
Farmer Wants a Wife started its final week of season two on Seven with 709,000 Sunday and 705,000 Monday. The two-part finale then did 767,000 Tuesday and wrapped with 853,000 on Wednesday.
The Matildas v New Zealand on Tokyo Day -2 (Wednesday) had an audience of 635,000.
On Thursday it was the Olyroos causing an upset of Tokyo Day -1 when they defeated Argentina with 582,000 watching.
Things really took off then on Friday with the Tokyo Olympic Ceremony doing 2.12m.
The audience swarmed all over Seven on Saturday with network share lifting to 59.2% and an audience over 1.25 watching the competition on Saturday night.
For more on the Tokyo Olympic TV ratings see our day-by-day guide here.
Nine’s Beauty and the Geek
Nine 16.2% primary share, 22.7% network share
Nine will navigate as best it can through the next two weeks.
The primary channel’s only entries in the top 20 for the week were for Nine News and the Sunday episode of Beauty and the Geek.
A Current Affair was on 771,000 for the week, up from 715,000 in Week 29.
Two other episodes of Beauty and the Geek were just over 600,000 and a repeat episode of Travel Guides on Wednesday was just under.
10’s The Cheap Seats debuted to 460,000
10 10.7% primary share, 17.1% network share
The primary channel’s biggest crowd of the week was 768,000 watching the Monday episode of Survivor Australia. It launched the night prior on 752,000. Tuesday was then on 730,000.
The Bachelor Australia had its smallest ever launch audience with 482,000 on Wednesday. But like Survivor, the audience for episode two also grew, this time to 502,000 on Thursday.
Have You Been Paying Attention? was on 746,000, close to last week’s 749,000.
The new 10 series The Cheap Seats is a HYBPA? spin-off and it debuted with 460,000 on Tuesday.
The Project 7pm was on 498,000 after 471,000 last week.
ABC 9.9% primary share, 14.0% network share
ABC News Sunday squeezed into the top 20 with 794,000. ABC News M-F was on 776,000.
7.30 was then on 664,000 after 637,000 the week prior.
Ms Represented and Grand Designs were both just under 600,000.
Shaun Micallef’s Mad As Hell was on 536,000 while a repeat of the Hard Quiz Kids Special was just over half a million.
Great Asian Railway Journeys’ host Michael Portillo
SBS 4.2% primary share, 6.7% network share
Who Do You Think You Are? led the way for the channel with just under 300,000 watching.
The only other entries breaking the 200,000 barrier were repeat episodes of Great Asian Railway Journeys on 234,000 and Birth of Empire: The East India Company on 220,000.