News

Seven’s Operation: Live pulls in 544,000 viewers on first night of 2019 TV ratings year

Seven’s late evening special, Operation: Live, attracted 544,000 metro viewers for its first episode, but Nine still won the first official ratings night of 2019.

From 9pm, Seven showcased a live caesarian procedure, the first of two live operation specials for the network. Last week the network pulled plans to run a live open-heart surgery, after concerns were voiced by surgeons. As a result, Seven changed its plans, moving its second special, the caesarian procedure, forward from tonight to last night.

According to OzTAM’s preliminary overnight figures, the surgery itself captured 429,000 metro viewers. Operation: Live was more popular than an encore of Ten’s Hughesy, We Have a Problem, which managed 321,000 in the same time slot, but it was outrated by Nine’s 60 Minutes, with 904,000 metro viewers from 8:30pm.

The show, combined with a series high audience of 1.046m for My Kitchen Rules and 951,000 metro viewers for Seven News, helped Seven’s main channel share to 22.8%. When adding in regional figures, the shows grew to 1.549m and 1.458m respectively.

But the strength of Nine’s 60 Minutes, coupled with 1.263m metro viewers for Married at First Sight, resulted in a win for Nine. The channel delivered a 26.2% main channel share. Nine also won the evening from a network perspective, with a 33.8% share over Seven’s 29.4%.

Married at First Sight and 60 Minutes were the most popular shows across the key advertising demographics of 16-39s, 18-49s and 25-54, and had national audiences of 1.718m and 1.274m respectively.

Ten’s most watched program of the evening was I’m A Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here, with 544,000 metro viewers for the show, and 625,000 for elimination. Those numbers climbed to 764,000 and 857,000, when including regional figures. Outside of I’m A Celebrity, Get Me Out of Here and Hughesy, We Have a Problem, Ten’s only other show to make the top 20 shows for Sunday was The Sunday Project 7pm, with 298,000 viewers. As a result, Ten averaged a share of 10.4% for the evening, behind the ABC’s 12.5%, but well ahead of SBS’ 2.7%.

ABC’s share comes from a metro audience of 645,000 for ABC News Sunday and 552,000 for a documentary on the oceans surrounding Australia, known as Magical Land of Oz.

In the morning battle, just 186,000 metro viewers tuned into Weekend Today on Nine which saw it beaten by ABC’s Insiders which averaged 252,000 viewers. Seven’s Weekend Sunrise was the top morning show with 244,000 metro viewers.

ADVERTISEMENT

Get the latest media and marketing industry news (and views) direct to your inbox.

Sign up to the free Mumbrella newsletter now.

 

SUBSCRIBE

Sign up to our free daily update to get the latest in media and marketing.