The Winners

  1. MasterChef: the winner (Ten) (7:30pm) — 3.962 million (all time Australian record).
  2. Undercover Boss (Ten) (9:40pm) — 2.082 million.
  3. Seven News (6pm) — 1.728 million.
  4. Nine News (6pm) — 1.602 million.
  5. Election 2010: The Great Debate (Seven) (6.30pm) — 1.245 million.
  6. 60 Minutes — The Great Debate (Nine) (6.30pm) — 1.229 million.
  7. Modern Family (Ten) (6.30pm) — 1.118 million.
  8. Dancing with the Stars (Seven) (7.30pm) — 1.061 million.
  9. Rules of Engagement (Ten) (7pm) — 1.051 million.

MasterChef was an all time high for a series program in Australian TV. Only the 2000 Olympics had a bigger audience; 6.64 million for the closing and 6.51 million for the opening ceremonies. That’s metro markets only. Add 1.160 million regional viewers for the announcement of the winner and the 3.962 million for the metros, you get around 5.12 million people across Australia, or about 22.7% of the Australian population. No other continuous program has achieved a 5 million plus national audience.

In metro markets, MasterChef gave Ten a 75% share of the commercial TV market when it was being broadcast.

The Losers

With MasterChef and The Debate how could anything lose?

News & CA

  1. Seven News (6pm) — 1.728 million.
  2. Nine News (6pm) — 1.602 million.
  3. Election 2010: The Great Debate (Seven) (6.30 pm) — 1.245 million.
  4. 60 Minutes — The Great Debate (Nine) (6.30pm) — 1.229 million.
  5. 60 Minutes (Nine) (7.30pm) — 765,000.
  6. Ten News (5pm) — 574,000.
  7. Australia Votes 2010: The Leaders’ Debate (ABC) (6.30pm) — 574,000.
  8. ABC News (6pm) – 394,000.
  9. Leaders’ Debate – Election 2010 (Ten) (10:45pm) — 364,000.
  10. Insiders (ABC) (9am) — 254,000.
  11. Landline (ABC) (12pm) –209,000.
  12. SBS News (6.30pm) — 191,000.
  13. Inside Business (ABC) (10am) — 172,000.
  14. Offsiders (ABC) (10.30am) — 165,000.
  15. Dateline (SBS) (8.30pm) — 120,000.

Mornings:

  1. Weekend Sunrise (Seven) (8am) — 348,000.
  2. Weekend Today (Nine) (8am) — 278,000.
  3. Meet The Press (Ten) (8am) — 42,000.

The ABC’s efforts with the debate flopped: just 574,000 for a broadcast that was wormless. The discussion afterwards flopped as well, 484,000 in the face of MasterChef. Nine has chat and some 60 Minutes from 7.30pm with Laurie Oakes and Australian Women’s Weekly editor, Helen McCabe in the studio discussing how their audience and their strangely fixed worm (which disappeared for a rest at one stage), went. Laurie didn’t believe the 61-39 score from the audience in favour of Ms Gillard. Just 765,000 people watched as MasterChef soared on Ten. A heroic decision by both Nine and the ABC, but then they didn’t have anything to counter Ten’s monster. Seven’s worm was clearer (polliegraph) and had a consensus line, something Nine just couldn’t give us.

Nine News won Sydney and Melbourne last night, Seven won Brisbane, Adelaide and Perth.

The Stats:

  • FTA: Ten with a share of 44.3%, from Seven with 21.6%, Nine, 19.3%, the ABC, 10.7% and SBS, 4.1%.
  • Main Channel: Ten with a share of 41.8%, from Seven with 19.0%, Nine, 15.7%, ABC1, 9.7% and SBS ONE, 3.7%.
  • Digital: GO won with a share of 3.6%, from 7TWO on 2.6%, ONE, 2.5% ABC2, 0.7% and ABC3 and SBS TWO with 0.4% each. The six FTA digital channels had a total share of 10.2% last night in prime time.
  • Pay TV: Ten won with 37.9%, from Seven on 18.5%, Nine on 16.5%, Pay TV’s 100 plus channels, 11.2%, the ABC, 9.2% and SBS, 3.5%. The 11 FTA channels had a share of 88.8% last night in prime time.
  • Regional: Here it was SC Ten easily with a share of 44.6%, from WIN/NBN with 22.9%, Prime/7Qld on 18.7%, the ABC, 7.6% and SBS, 4.25%. SC Ten won the main channels easily. GO won the digitals with 6.7%, from 7TWO on 3.3% and ONE on 2.1%.
  • Major Markets: It was Ten from Seven and Nine in every market, both overall and the main channels. GO won every market in the digitals, with either 7TWO or Go second or third.

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

Glenn Dyer’s comments: Last week Ten won All People and the main channels. Nine’s GO won the digitals. Seven was squeezed and was third all around. Ten won Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide and Perth. Nine won Brisbane. MasterChef was the only program of interest last week as it built. Friday night it averaged more than 1.8 million viewers for the last MasterChef Masterclass. That was the only night in six where its audience didn’t top the 2 million viewer average.

LAST NIGHT: TV history was made last night. The 5.1 million people who watched MasterChef wasn’t a shabby figure, nor was the 3.4 million or so who watched the debate in the metro areas on Nine, Seven, the ABC and Ten. With that figure, could we go another one or two? Australians were very interested in the debate and in the final of a cooking show. For all the tutt tutting about bread and circuses with Masterchef forcing the debate to move to an earlier timeslot, I think the TV audience got it about right last night.

Tonight, Ten comes back to earth and the ratings battle is more even. For those bored by politics, it means not watching News 24 on the ABC, The 7.30 Report, Lateline, Q&A, or Sky News on Foxtel until after August 21.

TONIGHT: No MasterChef, no Tour de France, withdrawal time. Australian Story, Q&A on the ABC. Man Vs. Wild on SBS at 8.30pm, Criminal Minds at the same time on Seven. Hot In Cleveland (debut on Nine, so take a sample). Good News Week back on Ten. Maybe Undercover Boss at 7.30pm on Ten.

Source: OzTAM, TV Networks reports