3.5 million watch My Kitchen Rules winner

The Glenn Dyer breakdown: As expected it was Seven’s night in the last week of ratings before Easter. Seven won thanks to My Kitchen Rules which had more than 2.8 million metro viewers for the winner’s announcement and nearly 2.2 million for the competition. That meant the preview of Pictures of You at 9.30pm did OK with 1.6 million viewers. But will it struggle without a big drawing program ahead of it? We will know after Easter.

The ABC’s new 8pm program Country Town Rescue averaged 582,000, which is about what Foreign Correspondent gets on a good night. Seeing it was up again the My Kitchen Rules machine on Seven, that’s a solid start for an interesting series.

The Biggest Loser on Ten at 7pm averaged a solid 872,000, with its second half up against the first half hour of My Kitchen Rules.

In Adelaide and Perth, Nine was so weak that it slipped to 4th behind ABC 1 in the main channels. The network and the WIN -owned channels are really on the nose in both markets at the moment, and the Nine Entertainment station in Brisbane isn’t as popular as the stations in Sydney and Melbourne.

Thanks to a solid audience for Insight and the news, SBS lifted its audience figure and share last night. In fact, SBS and Ten can look at last night and say they didn’t throw the towel in.

Revenge continues to lift its audience levels in the seven day recording figures — it is now more watched than My Kitchen Rules. On Monday, March 19 it had 277,000 extra viewers according to the “record and view” within seven days ratings from OzTAM. That made a total national figure of 2.710 million. My Kitchen Rules had an extra 90,000 viewers and was watched by a total of 2.638 million (these figures don’t include the seven day record and viewing figures for regional areas).

Tonight: No My Kitchen Rules on Seven, so will it be a closer night? Seven drops two episodes of Border Security in at 7.30pm and then follows it with Please Marry My Boy, which may lose more viewers because it doesn’t have such a strong lead in. The ABC has Woodley, Adam Hills in Gordon St Tonight and Agony Uncles, plus the final Kitchen Cabinet on ABC 2. SBS has the final Empire at 9.30pm.

Ten has The Biggest Loser and Talkin’ Bout My Generation and The Good Wife. Nine has The Mentalist, Mike & Molly (promoted from GO) and two The Big Bang Theory repeats.

The top 10 national programs (metro & regional combined):

My Kitchen Rules (winner announcement) (Seven) — 3.500 million
My Kitchen Rules (Seven) — 3.013 million
Pictures of You (Seven) – 2.179 million
Seven News — 1.733 million
Nine News — 1.542 million
Home and Away (Seven) — 1.484 million
A Current Affair (Nine) — 1.439 million
Today Tonight (Seven) — 1.385 million
ABC News — 1.369 million
The Biggest Loser (Ten) — 1.227 million

The Metro Winners:

My Kitchen Rules (winner announcement) (Seven) (9pm) — 2.812 million
My Kitchen Rules (Seven) (7.30pm) — 2.198 million
Pictures of You (Seven) (9.30pm) — 1.639 million
Seven News — 1.205 million
Today Tonight (Seven) (6.30pm) — 1.097 million
Home and Away (Seven (7pm) — 1.041 million
Nine News (6pm) — 1.029 million
ABC News (7pm) — 1.001 million

The Losers: Because it was the final of My Kitchen Rules, we can’t really call any program on another network a loser from last night.

Metro News & CA: Nine News won Sydney and Melbourne. Seven won the rest. Today Tonight won Sydney, lost Melbourne, won the rest. Insight on SBS at 8.30pm covered people who are trained to kill. It was chilling what I saw of it, but well worth doing.

Seven News — 1.205 million
Today Tonight (Seven) (6.30pm) — 1.097 million
Nine News (6pm) — 1.029 million
ABC News (7pm) — 1.001 million
A Current Affair (Nine) (6.30pm) — 941,000
Ten News (5pm) — 706,000
7.30 (ABC) (7.30pm) — 616,000
The Project (Ten) (6pm) — 455,000
Insight (SBS) (8.30pm) — 230,000
SBS News (6.30pm) –186,000
Lateline (ABC) (10.35pm) — 154,000
Dateline (SBS) (9.30pm) — 123,000
The Business (ABC) (11.10pm) — 90,000
SBS News (10.30pm) — 62,000
The Drum (News 24) (6pm)– 29,000.

*On News 24 simulcast

In the morning: Nine’s Mornings lifted sharply yesterday morning. Ten’s Breakfast remains lower than a week ago and even further behind News Breakfast on the ABC compared over the three hours from 6am.

Sunrise (Seven) (7am) — 391,000
Today (Nine) (7am) — 342,000
The Morning Show (Seven) (9am) — 182,000
Mornings (Nine) (9am) — 144,000
The Circle (Ten) (9am) — 47,000
Breakfast (Ten) (7am) — 36,000
News Breakfast (ABC) (6am) — 35,000 (+17,000)*

*On News 24 simulcast

Metro FTA: Seven (3 channels) won easily with a share of 42.3%, from Ten (3) on 19.2%, Nine (3) on 18.2%, the ABC (4) on 14.1% and SBS (2) on 6.1%. Seven leads the week on 36.7%, by a mile from Yen on 21.7% and Nine on 21.5%. Main Channels: Seven won easily with a share of 36.6% from Ten on 14.5%, Nine on 13.1%, ABC 1 on 10.7% and SBS ONE on 5.0%. Seven leads the week on 30.7% from Nine on 15.8% and Ten on 15.3%.

Metro Digital: 7mate won the night with a share of 3.3% from Eleven on 2.8%, Gem on 2.6%, GO on 2.5%, 7TWO on 2.4%, ABC 2 on 2.2%, ONE on 1.9%, SBS TWO on 1.1%, News 24 on 0.7% and ABC 3 on 0.6%. The 10 digital channels had an FTA share of 21.1% last night. ONE leads the week on 3.9% from 7TWO on 3.1% and GO on 3.0%.

Pay TV: Seven (3 channels) won with a share of 35.4%, from Ten (3) on 16.1%, Nine (3) on 15.2%, Pay TV (200 plus channels) was on 14.3%, the ABC (4) on 11.8% and SBS (2) on 5.1%. The 15 FTA channels had an FTA share last night of 85.9% with the five main channels on a share of 68.7% and the 10 digital channels on 17.0%.

The top five pay TV channels were:

Fox 8 (2.8%)
Sky News (2.0%)
TV 1 (2.0%)
Fox Classic (1.8%)
Crime and Investigation (1.8%)

The five most-watched programs on pay TV were:

Storage Wars (A&E) — 86,300
The Simpsons (Fox 8) — 82,900
Family Guy (Fox 8) — 80,200
The Walking Dead (Fx) (8.30pm) — 64,200
The Walking Dead (Fx) (9.13pm) — 62,400

Regional: Prime/7Qld (3 channels) won with a share of 38.1%, from WIN/NBN (3) on 20.9%, with SC Ten (3) on 19.7%, the ABC (4) on 15.0% and SBS (2) on 6.3%. Prime/7Qld won the main channels by miles with 29.9% from WIN/NBN on 15.4% and SC Ten on 15.2%. 7mate won the digitals with 4.6% from 7TWO on 3.6% and GO on 3.1%. The 10 digital channels had an FTA share last night of 23.3%. Prime/7Qld leads the week with 34.7% from WIN/NBN on 24.5%.

The five most-watched programs in regional markets were:

My Kitchen Rules — 826,000
My Kitchen Rules (winner announcement) — 824,000
Pictures of You — 538,000
Seven News — 528,000
Nine News — 513,000

Major Metro Markets: A sweep for Seven overall and the main channels in all five metro markets (naturally). Nine was second in Sydney (overall and the main channels). Ten was second in the main channels in Melbourne and second in Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth. ABC 1 pushed Nine out of third in Adelaide and Perth in what was probably the most interesting finish of the night. 7mate won everywhere bar Sydney where Gem won. Seven leads the week everywhere, Nine and Ten share second in Melbourne and Ten is second in Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth.

(All shares on the basis of combined overnight 6pm to midnight All People)

*Source: OzTAM, TV Networks reports