Glenn Dyer's TV ratings: Sandy storms home for Sunrise

Seven had hours of coverage of the US storm from 9 to 11am -- as well as coverage in Sunrise.

The Glenn Dyer breakdown: Seven’s night as The X Factor‘s results episode dominated with more than 1.4 million metro and over 2.2 million national viewers (again). The helped Winners & Losers to again do well from around 8.40pm with more than 1.1 million metro and over 1.7 million national viewers. Ten had a better night last night, while Nine was off the pace, especially in Adelaide and Perth.

Seven again dominated regional markets (actually the ratings from Adelaide, Perth and the regional markets have been very similar since The X Factor started on Seven and dominated the week. Seven is much further ahead in Adelaide, Perth and in regional markets than in Sydney and Melbourne in particular).

Seven had hours of coverage of the US storm from 9 to 11am — as well as coverage in Sunrise. Nine had coverage in Today (and Ten in Breakfast). Nine went to Mornings and then back to coverage. Ten used its Morning News. News 24 had good coverage and ratings in metro and regional markets in prime time last night as it covered the aftermath. On pay TV, Paul Murray on Sky News did well with a solid increase in his audience from 9pm yesterday with coverage of the aftermath. That, plus higher viewing numbers for other news program, boosted Sky News to second place among pay TV channels on Foxtel.

Meanwhile, 56 Up on SBS ONE at 7.30pm, the latest in the Up series (by Michael Apted) got 416,000 metro and 551,000 national viewers. ABC1’s doco on the growth of the Australian wine industry at 8.30pm (Chateau Chunder: A Wine Revolution) — 640,000 metro and 908,000 national viewers. It was more than OK, loaded with talent who knew what they were talking about. Foreign Correspondent (8pm, ABC1) did a good follow up on the safety problems in NZ’s extreme sports industry — viewer numbers jumped to 702,000 in metro markets and 1.042 million nationally. Those are very tasty figures for a report and line of questioning you would never see (but perhaps should) in travel and other soft content programs favoured by some networks. Dominique Schwartz was the reporter and it was another solid effort from her in bringing NZ to Australia beyond wine, rugby and horses.

Tonight: No Gruen, but A Moody Christmas on ABC1 at 8.30pm deserves attention. The Hamster Wheel follows straight on at 9pm. Seven has Criminal Minds and Surveillance Oz (which continues to surprise). Nine has Big Brother. Ten has Glee and The Good Wife which should improve (hopefully). Ten still has Emily Owens M.D. at 9.30pm despite being a contender for flop of the year (imported division), along with Vegas, also on Ten. Kitchen Cabinet on ABC2 sees Barnaby Joyce being served up, or rather, serving up to Annabel Crabb.

Program update: Late yesterday we learned that Australia’s Got Talent had fallen out of the second tier and into the “boned” basket at Seven, leaving hosts Dannii Minogue, Brian McFadden and Kyle Sandilands without a gig next year. Nine picked up Talent. This means that for the time being Dancing With The Stars lives on Seven, but will have to be freshened up with a bigger studio and new sets. Nine’s The Voice destroyed Talent when they ran head to head from May onwards of this year. And yet, The Voice has failed to dent the appeal of The X Factor in Australia this year which is holding up strongly. Nine looks like it will use Talent in the second half of next year. It will likely keep Minogue as a judge and find two new ones. Talent will run head to head against The X Factor on Seven, at this stage. It is the second failed hit from another network that Nine has snapped up after Big Brother which ran out of puff on the Ten Network. Big Brother is now fading on Nine and is struggling (in the key demos, not All People). Last night was BB‘s worst Tuesday of this series.

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

The X Factor (Seven) — 2.214 million.
Seven News — 1.829 million.
Winners & Losers (Seven) — 1.735 million.
Nine News — 1.706 million.
The Big Bang Theory (Nine) — 1.577 million.
ABC1 News (7pm) — 1.570 million.
A Current Affair (Nine) — 1.551 million.
Home and Away (Seven) — 1.462 million.
7.30 (ABC1) — 1.346 million.
Today Tonight (Seven) — 1.317 million.

The Metro Winners:

The X Factor (Seven, 7.30pm) — 1.430 million.
Seven News (6pm) — 1.246 million.
The Big Bang Theory (Nine, 8.30pm) — 1.157 million.
Nine News (6pm) — 1.143 million.
Winners & Losers (Seven, 8.40pm) — 1.113 million.
ABC1 News (7pm) — 1.113 million.
Today Tonight (Seven, 6.30pm) — 1.046 million.
A Current Affair (Nine, 6.30pm) — 1.024 million.

The Losers: Nine, Mike and Molly at 9.30pm (replacing Two and a Half Men) and 10pm, 443,000 metro (not coded in regional markets) and 372,000 metro (and not coded as well national viewers). That made Nine a weak fourth from 9.30pm.Metro News & CA: Nine News won Sydney, Melbourne (by 115,000) and Brisbane, but Seven News won nationally thanks to a massive winning 171,000 margin in Perth. Seven also won Adelaide. It was the same story at 6.30pm with A Current Affair winning Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane, but Today Tonight won Adelaide and in Perth won by 133,000. But as we see with the national figures, TT couldn’t keep its lead thanks to the normal turn off from the program in regional areas in favour of ACA. But Seven News again extended its lead thanks to better support from regional viewers.

Seven News (6pm) — 1.246 million.
Nine News (6pm) — 1.143 million.
ABC1 News (7pm) — 1.113 million.
Today Tonight (Seven, 6.30pm) — 1.046 million.
A Current Affair (Nine, 6.30pm) — 1.024 million.
7.30 (ABC1, 7.30pm) — 883,000.
Foreign Correspondent (ABC1, 8pm) — 702,000.
Ten News (5pm) — 883,000.
The Project (Ten, 6.30pm) — 520,000.
The Project (Ten, 6pm) –350,000.
Ten Late News (10.30pm) — 344,000.
Insight (SBS ONE, 8.30pm) –238,000.
SBS News (6.30pm) — 180,000.
Lateline (ABC1, 10.30pm) — 178,000.
Dateline (SBS ONE, 9.30pm) — 121,000.
The Business (ABC1, 11.05pm, repeat) — 117,000.
SBS Late News (10.30pm) — 88,000.
The Drum (News 24, 10pm, repeat) — 43,000.

In the morning: Seven pre-empted The Morning Show with extended Sunrise coverage of Sandy in the US. Nine kept The Morning Show on but had Storm coverage from 11am. Ten used its Morning News at 10am. News Breakfast on ABC1 and News 24 got a nice boost and its combined audience topped 100,000 (105,000) for the second time only. Ten’s Breakfast had a small rise as well.

Sunrise (Seven, 7am) — 377,000.
Today (Nine, 7am) — 355,000.
Sunrise Extended (Seven, 9 am) — 222,000.
Sunrise Special (Seven, 11am, not Perth) — 167,000.
Mornings (Nine, 9am) — 127,000.
News Breakfast (ABC1, 7am) — 63,000 + 43,000 on News 24.
Breakfast (Ten, 7am) — 46,000.

Metro FTA: Seven (three channels) won with a share of 31.3%, from Nine (three) back on 23.7%, Ten (three) was third with 20.1%, the ABC (four) was on 18.3% and SBS (two) ended on 6.7%. Seven leads the week with 30.1% from Nine on 26.8%, the ABC on 19.1% and Ten close up on 18.7% (and heading for its best week in three months?). Main Channel: Seven won with 24.9% from Nine on 18.6%, Ten on 14.7%, ABC1 on 13.8% and SBS ONE on 5.0%. Seven leads the week with 22.8% from Nine on 29.3%, ABC1 is on 14.8% and Ten is in 4th on 12.9%.

Metro Digital: Digital viewing was unusually low last night: 7TWO won with a share of 3.3%, from 7mate with 3.1%, Eleven on 2.8%, Gem on 2.7%, ONE was on 2.5%, GO was on 2.4%, ABC2, 2.3%. SBS TWO was on 1.7%, News 24, 1.2% (and boosted by the US storm news), with ABC3 on 1.0%.

Metro including Pay TV: Seven (three channels) won with a share of 26.1%, from Nine (three) on 19.8%, Ten (three) was third with 16.8%, the ABC (four) was on 15.3% and SBS (two) ended on 5.6%. The 15 FTA channels had had a total share last night of 85.7% with the five main channels share on 66.9% and the 10 digital channels share a low 18.8%. Pay TV had a share of 14.3% thanks to the 200 plus channels on Foxtel.

The top five pay TV channels were:

TV 1 — 2.5%
Sky News — 2.4%
Fox 8 — 2.2%.
LifeStyle — 2.1%.
Fox Sports 2 — 2.1%.

The five most-watched programs on pay TV were:

The Walking Dead (FX) — 92,000.
Pawn Stars (A&E) — 69,0900.
Paul Murray Live (Sky News) — 61,000.
Storage Wars (A&E) — 55,000.
The Simpsons (Fox 8 ) — 51,000,

Regional: Prime/7Qld (three channels) won with a share of 36.5%, from WIN/NBN (three) on 23.4%, SC Ten (three) was third with 17.7%, the ABC (four) was on 17.1% and SBS (two) ended on 5.3%. Prime/7Qld won the main channels with 26.1% from WIN/NBN on 17.5%, SC Ten was third with 13.3%, ahead of ABC 1 on 11.5%. The 10 digital channels had an FTA share last night of 27.8%. Prime/7Qld leads the week with 33.7% from WIN/NBN on 26.1%, the ABC on 18.5% and SC Ten on fourth with 17.2%.

The five most-watched programs in regional markets (including Tasmania and regional WA) were:

The X Factor — 783,000.
Winners & Losers — 623,000.
Seven News — 584,000.
Nine News — 563,000.
A Current Affair — 526,000.

Major Metro Markets: A clean sweep for Seven (overall and in the main channels). Nine was second in Sydney, Melbourne and Brisbane. In Sydney the ABC/ABC1 were third, in Melbourne and Brisbane it was Ten third. In Adelaide Ten was second overall and in the main channels, while Nine was third. In Perth Ten was second overall and in the main channels and the ABC/ABC1 were third. Nine was a weak fourth. Once again Nine is not that strong in Adelaide and Perth. In the digitals, 7TWO won Melbourne, Brisbane and Adelaide. In Perth ONE and Eleven tied in first spot, while Gem won Sydney where viewing levels for the digital channels were very low. For the week so far, Nine leads in Sydney and Melbourne, Seven leads the rest and nationally. Ten is now third behind Nine in Brisbane and Adelaide, the ABC is third in Sydney and Melbourne and in Perth, it’s the ABC second and Nine third.

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

Source: Oztam, TV Networks data