NFL’s Week 1 Draws Record 22.3 Million Average Viewers, Nielsen Changes Boost Counts

The NFL averaged 22.3 million viewers per game during opening week, the highest Week 1 per-game audience on record and the second consecutive year the league has set that mark, the league and Nielsen said Thursday.

The 22.3 million per-game average across TV and digital platforms represented a 5% increase from last season’s Week 1 average of 21 million. The league said some of the increase resulted from changes in how audiences are counted: Nielsen began using its Big Data + Panel methodology for all events beginning Sept. 1 and expanded its measurement to include out-of-home viewers (except in Hawaii and Alaska) and data from smart TVs in addition to cable and satellite set-top boxes. Nielsen previously measured only the top 44 media markets, which covered about 65% of the country.

NBC had the two most-watched games of the opening slate. Defending Super Bowl champion Philadelphia’s 24-20 victory over Dallas in Thursday night’s kickoff averaged 28.3 million viewers across TV and digital platforms, the second-most watched NFL Kickoff game on record. That game had been averaging 31.6 million before a weather delay in the third quarter that stopped play for more than an hour and affected final audience totals.

NBC’s Sunday night opener — Buffalo’s 41-40 victory over Baltimore — averaged 24.7 million, the most-watched Sunday night opener since 2022. NBC and Peacock combined to average 26.5 million across the two NBC-window games, the network’s second-highest opening week average; NBC’s highest was the 2015 pairing of Steelers-Patriots and Cowboys-Giants, which averaged 27.2 million.

CBS’s late-afternoon game between Detroit and Green Bay, a 27-13 Packers win, averaged 24 million, the network’s most-watched Week 1 game since it reacquired NFL rights in 1998. Overall, CBS averaged 20.4 million for its doubleheader package of six games. The league’s early four-game window, headlined by Pittsburgh’s 34-32 win over the New York Jets, averaged 17.1 million.

ESPN’s Monday night game — Minnesota’s 27-24 comeback win over Chicago — averaged 22.1 million across ESPN, ABC and ESPN2, the second-most watched Monday Night Football game since ESPN became the primary broadcaster in 2006 and an 8% increase over last year. Fox’s early Sunday singleheader, led by Washington’s 21-6 win over the New York Giants, averaged 17.9 million.

International and streaming windows also contributed to the Week 1 totals. Last Friday’s game in Brazil between the Los Angeles Chargers and Kansas City Chiefs averaged 17.3 million viewers globally on YouTube TV and NFL digital platforms; the U.S. average for the Chargers’ 27-21 victory was 16.2 million, which included over-the-air broadcasts in Los Angeles and Kansas City.

This was the third straight season in which at least four of the 16 Week 1 games averaged at least 20 million viewers. League officials and Nielsen cautioned that the updated measurement methodology affects comparability with previous years, noting the broader inclusion of out-of-home viewing and smart-TV data likely contributed to higher reported audiences.

The Week 1 figures come as the NFL continues to be the most-watched U.S. sport on television, with broadcasters and the league emphasizing cross-platform totals to reflect viewing across traditional linear TV and digital streams. The league plans to continue releasing combined TV and digital audience figures throughout the season as networks and platforms provide data under the new Nielsen methodology.

All figures were provided by the NFL and Nielsen.