There was something in it for everyone last night, even SBS, which had a slightly better Monday night. The ABC’s parade of news and current affairs programs did OK, but they remain off the pace of previous years in terms of viewing numbers, especially Australian Story (803,000 nationally) which used to be a weak night in the metros. It has been hurt by the slide in viewers from the 7pm ABC News and 7.30 which had a little spark last night with the Leigh Sales interview with Hillary Clinton — 936,000 viewers nationally. 

The Voice did ok for Nine — 1.27 million for the start of another week. MasterChef grabbed 1.10 million nationally at the start of its cycle on Ten and House Rules brought up the rear with 1.09 million for Seven. But when the top five programs nationally are news and current affairs programs from 6pm to 7.30pm, you know the post 7.30pm stuff, especially on the commercial networks is pretty average, boring in fact — seen it all before, same old, same old. Nine won total people, the main channels and shares the demos with Seven and Ten.

In regional markets it was Seven News first with 623,000, then Seven News/Today Tonight with 535,000, Home and Away with 471,000, then House Rules with 422,000, and was the 5.30pm part of The Chase with 415,000.

Network channel share:

  1. Nine (27.6%)
  2. Seven (26.5%)
  3. Ten (21.5%)
  4. ABC (18.0%)
  5. SBS (6.4%)

Network main channels:

  1. Nine (20.2%)
  2. Seven (16.6%)
  3. Ten (16.0%)
  4. ABC (13.2%)
  5. SBS ONE (4.9%)

Top 5 digital channels: 

  1. 7mate (4.6%)
  2. 7TWO (3.7%)
  3. ABC Kids/Comedy, GO (3.2%)
  4. ONE (3.0%)

Top 10 national programs:

  1. Seven News  — 1.686 million
  2. Seven News/Today Tonight — 1.541 million
  3. Nine/NBN News 6.30  — 1.377 million
  4. Nine/NBN News — 1.321 million
  5. A Current Affair (Nine) — 1.297 million
  6. The Voice— 1.274 million
  7. Home and Away (Seven) — 1.148 million
  8. 7pm ABC News — 1.1174 million
  9. Masterchef Australia (Ten) — 1.102 million
  10. House Rules (ABC) — 1.095 million

Top metro programs:

  1. Seven News — 1.063 million
  2. Nine News 6.30 — 1.007 million
  3. Seven News/Today Tonight — 1.006 million

Losers: No one really. House Rules continues to under impress. The Voice faded last night.

Metro news and current affairs:

  1. Seven News — 1.063 million
  2. Nine News 6.30 — 1.007 million
  3. Seven News/Today Tonight — 1.006 million
  4. Nine News —990,000
  5. A Current Affair (Nine) – 902,000
  6. 7pm ABC News – 772,000
  7. 7.30 (ABC) — 646,000
  8. The Project 7pm (Ten) — 579,000
  9. Australian Story (ABC)  — 571,000
  10. Four Corners (ABC) — 541,000

Morning (National) TV:

  1. Sunrise (Seven) – 450,000
  2. Today (Nine) – 369,000
  3. News Breakfast (ABC. News 24) — 239,000
  4. The Morning Show (Seven) — 221,000
  5. Today Extra (Nine) — 184,000
  6. Studio 10 (Ten) — 111,000

Top five pay TV programs:

  1. AFL: 360 (Fox Footy) — 97,000
  2. NRL: 360 (Fox League) — 77,000
  3. AFL: On The Couch (Fox Footy) — 73,000
  4. Westworld (showcase) — 72,000
  5. The Bolt Report (Sky News) — 53,000